Damen Shipyards delivered a complete equipment package for the multipurpose vessel ENDAM. Owned by the Korean Marine Environment Management Corporation (KOEM), the newbuild combines emergency oil spill recovery activities with maintenance dredging tasks.

With a 4,100 m3 hopper hold, the vessel was built by HJ Shipbuilding & Construction at its Busan yard and designed by KmsEmec. The mission equipment package provided by the Damen Technical Cooperation (DTC) team included a 15 m rigid oil sweep arm with a dedicated pump and handling crane for the emergency oil spill recovery functionality, and a complete turnkey dredging system, which was designed specifically for the vessel.

Turnkey dredge package

The turnkey dredge package consisted of both loading and discharging equipment, a hydraulic system, dredging control system and various drives. A 900 mm trailing suction pipe, designed to dredge at a maximum depth of -30m, is hoisted by three dedicated gantries and their hydraulically operated winches. All the trailing suction pipe components are located starboard aft.

A Damen dredge pump, type BP9075HD, completed the dredge pipe arrangements. The highly efficient slurry pump is designed for both suction dredging, as well as discharging over the bow using the bow coupling unit or rainbow nozzle. This hopper discharging equipment, including 12 bottom dump valves which Damen designed, were all part of the dredge package. Furthermore, dredge valves in various pressure stages were delivered for the suction and discharge piping. Dedicated dredging instrumentation completed the package. This is crucial to monitor and visualise the dredging process and to optimise the dredging operations.

Component integration

Due to the DTC team’s extensive experience in component integration at non-Damen yards, the large system parts were delivered from the Netherlands and integrated effortlessly. As well as the mission equipment, the delivery scope included a hydraulic system. This is a logical choice as the dredging equipment is its main user. Additionally, a 3,500-kW electric dredge pump drive and a 1,000-kW electric jet water pump drive were shipped to Korea. The delivery was completed with a full set of spares and Damen also carried out the commissioning and training on board.

The vessel was named ENDAM, which means ‘the fence that protects you’ in the Korean Jeju dialect. A festive handover ceremony took place in the summer and ENDAM has successfully started operating along the Korean coast.