Miclyn Express Offshore Limited (MIO) announced the purchase of two 330 foot Barges. The Barges will be immediately deployed as part of the fleet executing the transportation project for the infrastructure development of the LNG export facilities at Barrow Island in North West Australia.
It is envisaged that the new Barges will be fully utilised for the next 12 months in this project. The transportation project continues to ramp up beyond initial expectations, with 22 vessels currently operating in the shuttle.
MIO has experienced increasing demand for its Barges that are 300 foot and above (now 8 in the fleet). To service the demand from various projects, 12 Barges are currently chartered in from third parties to supplement MIO’s fleet.
MIO expects utilisation to remain strong for its larger Barge fleet and the purchased Barges are forecasted to achieve attractive payback periods. As part of a fleet rebalancing exercise, MIO plans to divest some of its smaller Barges which have experienced utilisation challenges in past reporting periods.
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Source: Miclyn Express Offshore, June 27, 2011;