Case Study
Turnkey Transportation Engineering for the Aircraft Alliance
OVERVIEW
Malin was given the job of safely moving all of the large, and critically important blocks for the Aircraft Carrier Programme, from their various construction yards around the UK, to the consolidation dock at Rosyth. It is a project that demonstrates the value of a turnkey transportation solution.
Forming one of the largest and most ambitious engineering projects in the UK, with a distributed build strategy across numerous UK shipyards, the Royal Navy’s Queen Elizabeth Class aircraft carrier programme required a number of block moves across the UK. Sections had to be transported by sea to Rosyth, before being assembled into the 65,000 tonne, 280 metres long finished carriers.
To successfully deliver the project, Malin developed:
- Operational manuals
- Transportation method statements
- Operational storyboards
- Risk assessments covering everything from the arrival and departure of the transport barge, through to load-out, sea towage, float-off and the installation, and subsequent removal of the sea-fastening steelwork.
- Design of the transportation cradle
- Sea-fastening arrangements
- Structural verification of the carrier block for the very different loads it would experience during weighing
- SPMT transportation
- Load-out ballasting calculations
- Seagoing and float-off stability assessments
- Hydrodynamic analysis of the barge’s motions at sea
- Detailed stability checks, covering load-out, transportation and submergence.
The numerical models used for the transport analysis were also verified through physical towing-tank tests, providing another level of confidence before the actual voyage took place, whilst studies were completed for the load-out operation, temporary lay-by berthing, the four-point mooring spread required during float-off, and the block’s mooring arrangement following delivery.
Client: Aircraft Carrier Alliance (ACA)
Project: Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carrier Programme
Cargo: Lower Block 02 (LB02)
Route: Portsmouth to Rosyth
Services: Transportation engineering, naval architecture, structural verification, sea-fastening and cradle design, hydrodynamics, stability, ballasting and mooring analysis