By Tony Millward, Senior Project Manager, A2SEA A/S

Complex geotechnics, a tight, seven-month winter project, and a client whose programme called for multiple, simultaneous vessel operations. With demands like these, the Anholt project needed as much as it could get of that magic ingredient: teamwork. And its steep learning curves meant, however, that the A2SEA team was under plenty of pressure.

Anholt was always going to be a challenging project, and it was the first time A2SEA had deployed more than one vessel at a time. With a varied, difficult seabed, the project required different types of vessels in different areas. The semi-jacking SEA POWER could work in shallower, less complex areas at low cost. SEA JACK and SEA INSTALLER, both jackup vessels, could handle deeper areas. Finally, SEA WORKER could penetrate the deepest locations.

Another challenge was the small harbour, limiting vessel access. When, at one point, we were actually using three vessels, coordinating it all was close to rocket science.

What did we learn? First, the moment you bring in more than one vessel, things get far more complicated. It took a lot of coordination for DONG Energy, Siemens and A2SEA together, making decisions about which vessel goes alongside first, which vessels should wait and so on. Close teamwork is crucial. And the teams themselves need to be structured differently, with a project team for each vessel.

Instead of one management team running everything, we split things up so that during the really challenging time in January where we had two vessels working and two mobilising, as many as four project managers were working, each responsible for their own vessel or a specific area to work with and coordinate, and acting as a single point of contact for the vessels and the client. Pulling it all together required a delicate mix of both consensus and dictatorship! Also, from a teamwork and coordination standpoint, using A2SEA vessels only rather than sourcing from more than one supplier turned out to be a major advantage.

Perhaps the main lesson was the amount of work involved in mobilisations. With up to three at the same time, we were just going from meeting to meeting, constantly switching from talking about one vessel to discussing another – and having to keep our heads clear about which details were associated with each.

It was a tough learning experience but, despite worse than expected weather conditions, the project was clearly a success. Almost everything we learned was immediately applied at Gwynt y Môr, where there, too, are dedicated project managers for each vessel, and extra team members all around.

Overall, I’m proud of the project and so are the vessels, particularly given the way the vessels worked together, coordinating people going in and out, sharing crew when necessary and demonstrating a real Team Built spirit.

 

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