Vantage Drilling’s new super-drillship Titanium Explorer is starting its career working for Petrobras in the US Gulf of Mexico, rather than offshore Brazil.
The vessel was delivered in April and was supposed to start into an eight-year, $1.6billion contract with Petrobras. However, acceptance trials were interrupted during the third quarter by Hurricane Isaac, which necessitated steaming out of harm’s way.
Most trials are now complete, including third party certification of the blowout preventer (BOP). That said, the functional tests of the BOP in deepwater were unfortunately interrupted by operational issues of the customer-supplied remotely-operated vehicle, which cost about ten days of testing time.
During the delays, it was noted there was a main machinery issue and, following consultation with the engine manufacturer, MAN B&W of Germany, it was decided it would be prudent to not only repair the problem, but to undertake a preventative upgrade to all six primary engines aboard the vessel.
Machinery repairs and the upgrades were due for completion during November. Thereafter, deepwater acceptance testing would resume.
Paul Bragg, CEO at Vantage, said: “We expect to commence operations under the drilling contract in December.
“We are clearly disappointed by the disruptions and delays we have encountered commencing operations for the Titanium Explorer, but we believe we are very close to a successful commencement of our contract.”
Petrobras has the right to relocate and utilise the Titanium Explorer on a worldwide basis as necessary.
On another front, Vantage has invested $31million in a new joint venture established for the purpose of constructing a high-spec drillship at STX Offshore & Shipbuilding in South Korea. Through its investment, Vantage will initially own approximately 42% of equity in the joint venture entity, known as Sigma Drilling.
Sigma was formed for the sole purpose of constructing a BT-UDS class vessel at STX.
It will be capable of working in water depths to 12,000ft; of coping with variable deck loadings up to 25,000 tonnes; it will be equipped with a dual activity derrick; carry two seven-ram blow out preventer units and be capable of storing up to twelve subsea Xmas trees.
Vantage’s owned fleet currently consists of four Baker Marine Pacific class 375 jack-up drilling rigs, the two ultra-deepwater drillships Platinum Explorer and the Titanium Explorer, plus the Tungsten Explorer is under construction.