SMM 2012: Western Marine Receives GL-Keel Laying Certificate

Bangladeshi Shipyard Western Marine has successfully laid the keel for a Germanischer Lloyd classed (GL) tug boat under construction for the Chittagong Port Authority.

The new tug will be Western Marine’s 100th newbuilding. Torsten Schramm, COO of GL and Falk Rothe, GL Executive Vice President, Classification Service Delivery, presented the certificate to Sakhawat Hossain, Managing Director of Western Marine Shipyard Ltd., on Thursday the 7th of September at the SMM 2012 international trade fair. At the same event Western Marine signed a contract with GL for the classification of the first three vessels of a new containership series intended for Dhaka Chittagong Services.

“From the beginning of Western Marine Shipyard we have grown together with GL and we are very proud to receive this certificate for our 100th ship we build and which GL will class,” said Sakhawat Hossain at the ceremony in Hamburg. ”We are looking forward to build further vessels with the excellent support of GL. We have found that European buyers especially are confident when they look at our vessels and see the GL mark, because this stands for the highest quality in ship classification.” An important milestone for Western Marine Shipyard, in this respect, was the delivery of eight just-in-time completed ships to German Grona shipping company, Mr Hossain noted, all classed with GL.

“GL has supported the Bangladeshi shipbuilding industry intensively over the past several years. Assessing new designs and helping with documentation and supervision, we are extremely happy to be once again working with Western Marine to provide classification services for this new series of container vessels,” said Falk Rothe at the contract signing ceremony at GL’s booth at SMM.

The new contract is the first order related to a Bangladesh infrastructure improvement project, which to date comprises 32 new vessels. The three containerships are scheduled to be delivered in 2013.