Dutch-Built 5,400 hp Pushboat Heads for DP World's Parana Iron Ore Run
Three independent steering machines and 383 cubic metres of fuel for a 3,000 km one-way transit
The pushboat DPW Lapacho was launched at Royal T Shipyards in Kampen on Wednesday 19 August, bound for the Parana river in Paraguay, where it will move iron ore across a trade defined by long distances, shallow water and very little tolerance for technical failure.
The vessel was built to the order of DP World. It is designed to push a tow five barges wide and five barges long, some 15,000 tonnes of cargo in a single unit. The power to move that comes from three Wartsila engines of 1,320 kW each, close to 5,400 hp in total.
Johan Penninga, senior sales manager at Wartsila, says that installed power is no luxury. A single voyage covers 3,000 kilometres in each direction without a break, keeping the crew away from home for two months, through a stretch of uninhabited rainforest that is an unusually poor place to break down. Reliability, on that profile, outranks everything else.
The hull reflects the river rather than the cargo. Leo van Zon, sales manager at Damen Marine Components, describes an unusually high stern and a broader overall design intended to add buoyancy and hold draft to a maximum of 2.00 metres. The Parana is shallow enough that a laden tow runs with roughly 30 centimetres of water under the keel, and the boat effectively works as a vacuum cleaner, drawing stones and debris through the propellers. From the moment the engines start until the tow reaches its destination, they run continuously at about 90 percent of available power.
That duty cycle is why each of the three propellers has its own steering machine, so that the failure of one still leaves the vessel able to steer and continue. Bunker capacity is sized to match the distance, with 383,000 litres carried on board.
The ambassador of Paraguay and a number of suppliers attended the launch. The accommodation block was due to be installed the following day, providing for fifteen crew, after which the DPW Lapacho goes on transport to Paraguay.
The vessel measures 39.70 metres by 15.18 metres with a draft of 1.95 metres.
