Ampelmann brings marine crew change solutions to ADIPEC

Ampelmann has supported the offshore crew change market with more than 180,000 offshore workers transferred safely to date – 100,000 this year alone through its innovative offshore marine crew change solutions. The company operates a number of motion compensated gangway systems which have been developed specifically for crew change operations in the Middle East, Gulf of Mexico and Asia Pacific regions.

 The company has already deployed three gangways in the Caspian Sea, off the coast of Baku since 2015 and Dubai since 2017. Ampelmann’s crew change solutions including the A-type, L-type and newly introduced S-type gangway systems are a safe, reliable and more cost-effective alternatives to helicopter and swing rope transfers.

Jan van der Tempel, founder and CEO of Ampelmann, commented: “The main drivers in the crew change market are safety and efficiency. There is an increasing awareness within international oil companies that current operations can be significantly improved in these areas to de-risk their logistics operation and ultimately increase productivity.

“A key factor for this is poor helicopter safety statistics and an increasing pressure on OPEX due to the ‘lower-for-longer’ oil price levels. We have already successfully transformed three operations from helicopter to marine-based crew change solutions in the last two years.”

Ampelmann’s commitment to innovative personnel transfer systems resulted in the development of the S-type gangway this year, produced specifically for the crew change market. Scheduled to start production in 2018, the system is designed to be fully integrated into large, high speed vessels for long-term crew change operations. For the global oil and gas market where volume of crew is high and the sea state can be severe, the S-type can continuously transfer 50 people and luggage within five minutes in significant wave heights of up to three metres. Due to the innovative design of the compensation technology, it offers vessel owners a huge energy saving of up to 50 per cent compared to Ampelmann’s current gangway systems.

“There is a perception that since the industry downturn there are less people working on assets offshore and therefore, a greatly reduced number requiring transport to their workplace. Our experience is that the industry continues to be very active and workers still need a safe and efficient way to get to work to ensure the sector continues to survive and thrive,” added Van der Tempel.