boat month
First RAstar 3200 Tugs from Robert Allan Ltd.
In late February 2009, the RAstar 3200 Class tug Monterrey was delivered to its owners, Servicios Mar�timos de Baja California, S. de R.L de C.V. of Mexico. The Monterrey was built by Union Naval Valencia (UNV) of Valencia, Spain. Servicios Mar�timos is a joint venture between Moran Towing of the U.S. and Grupo Boluda of Spain. The Monterrey is the first of four tugs expressly designed to work at the Costa Azul LNG terminal on the north-west coast of Mexico. The terminal is exposed to fully developed Pacific swells. Design requirements stipulated that the tug and its winch be able to sustain a line pull of 75 tons throughout the entire terminal approach in a 6.5 ft swell. The resulting winch dominates every aspect of the vessel design. In addition, the owners required the entire design be less than 500 GRT. In order to cope with the predominant sea conditions, Robert Allan Ltd. chose the new RAstar hull form for best sea-keeping. The 500 GRT constraint forced some minor modifications to that concept and a shortening of the forecastle.
12 MN
of the
June 2009