General – Petrobras
Ampelmann has extended its contract with Solstad Offshore to provide a motion-compensated gangway for Petrobras by another two years.
The company’s A-type was fitted onto the Normand Valliant in 2022 and will continue to operate until August 2026, or until further options are taken.
Two contracts between these companies highlight their strong ongoing partnership. In June 2024, Ampelmann’s A-type was joined by the one-and-a-half times larger E-type motion-compensated gangway, which is currently operational on the Normand Fortress.
“This is an important moment for us,” says Jairo Prezzi, Ampelmann’s Business Developer for South America. “We are particularly pleased to see such extended trust in our gangways and services.”
Increasingly well known in Brazil, Ampelmann’s gangways are known globally for their innovative hexapod that allows them to compensate for motions in six degrees of freedom (6DOF). Able to operate safely during rough sea conditions, their precision, reactivity and low gangway telescoping speeds mean they are especially well equipped to handle the divergent motions of two floating objects such as FPSOs, Single Point (Bouy) Moorings (SPMs) and floating wind turbines.
As of this summer, four of Ampelmann’s gangways have been assisting with a variety of offshore work, ranging from decommissioning, maintenance and crew change. In addition to the two gangways signed for Solstad Offshore, a second A-type and the fully electric, lightweight S-type have also been commissioned for work on long-term projects in Brazil’s growing offshore energy sector.
Within a combined total of over 2500 days of operations, more than 200,000 transferees have used these four gangways since 2022.
