Specialist heavy lift vessel with 150 t. swl Stülcken Derrick and capability of loading 400 tonnes loads over the stern ramp and 1000 tonnes over the bow ramp. After being sold she has operated in Brazil to transport railway locomotives from north of the Amazon to Santos for overhaul. But now is used as a promotional vessel for the Brazilian Kaiser brewing company!

Displacement (tons): 105 Standard, 135 Full Load Dimensions (feet): 107.8 x 20 x 11.10 Propulsion: 2 x Paxman 12Y JCM diesels, 3,000 hp, 2 shafts Max. Speed (knots): 25 Armament: 2 x 12.7mm MGs, 1 x 81mm mortar Complement: 21 Commissioned: 24/2/75  All built by Brooke Marine Ltd., Lowestoft, England.

‘Starman Express’ ~ Extract from Gangway Number 7 Spring 1976

 Starman continues to lead a very active life. As reported in the last issue of an accommodation module with its own helideck was loaded at Port Arthur, Texas, for Rotterdam. Its dimensions of 66’ x 44’ x 22’, with the hexagonal helideck on top 83’ across, presented quite a few problems. To clear all obstructions, the module had to be loaded onto hardwood pedestals 4’ 6” high, leaving the base over hanging 8’, and the helideck 23’, on the starboard side. As welding had been expressly forbidden, the Starman team had to design and build a steel-pipe lattice structure, itself weighing 11 tons, to anchor the module to the deck in 44 places. Securing was also a problem inside the module: everything had to be taken care of, including washing machines, conference tables, drinking fountains, chairs, desks, a pool table—right down to the last tooth-.glass. Underdeck was a cargo of drill pipe, collars and drilling spares, and a loaded groupage of 40’ containers. The operation proved a complete success, for even a brief encounter with hurricane Doris, off Miami, failed to budge a single item. Thus opened BSL’s latest container service:

‘Starman Express Gulf Service’, at 12 knots!

 The module was offloaded at Rotterdam, whilst the remainder of the cargo was carried on to Aberdeen. After a brief stay at Smith’s Dock for modifications, it was off to Skikda, Algeria, with cargo of eight pressure vessels from Middlesbrough.

The longest load

On return, Starman loaded at Dunkirk the first and largest pressure vessel for the new ICI works at Wilton, Teesside. This was a caustic scrubber 187’ long and 22’ in diameter, weighing 268 tons. This voyage put Starman into the Guinness Book of Records, as the pressure vessel was the longest piece of cargo ever to enter or leave a UK port.

Starman has secured the contract to carry ten such vessels from Dunkirk to Teesside, for ICI at Wilton, as well as seven pressure vessels from Rotterdam to the new Monsanto extension at Seal Sands, Teesside. As the length of the cargoes prohibits any road movement the second group will have to be rolled off at Monsanto’s small private jetty on the river. These 17 vessels will keep us busy through out the winter.

To fill the gaps between voyages, we have taken earth moving equipment to Flotta, in the Orkneys, five pressure vessels from Rotterdam to Mersa-El-Brega, Libya—the largest 184’ long, weighing 220 tons—and eight leg sections of a jack-up drill ship to Piraeus. This last cargo was loaded wholly on deck and had a total volume of nearly 5000 cubic metres.

D R Parks

Starman Limited

An Atlantic First for “Starman” ~ Extract from Gangway

Another notable first was achieved by the Starman team in July when the longest ever pressure vessel was transported across the Atlantic from Holland to Canada.
14 months of meticulous planning and organisation came to a highly successful conclusion when the giant 286-foot-long and 24-foot-diameter splitter column, weighing 400 tons, was safely rolled ashore in Sarnia, Ontario from Starman America at a specially prepared berth adjacent to the new petrochemicals complex.
The column was built at Breda, a Dutch inland town, in four sections, and then barged in separate pieces to NDSM’s works in Amsterdam. There the sections were joined together and fitted with the seven specially designed support saddles which would keep the bending tolerances down to the minimum five millimetres throughout the whole operation.
Landing day began with two floating cranes lifting the column. After some careful manoeuvring it was finally positioned onto two sets of modular bogies on a flat topped pontoon. After securing, the pontoon was towed to Starman America
in the commercial section of the port.
Using just the two eight-ton forward mooring winches and two sets of three fold purchases, the whole load was rolled on board, filling all the available deck space with just 18 inches to spare. The bogies were then removed, the column set up on pedestals, and a complicated securing arrangement made which took two days to complete.

24-minute offload

The sea passage was uneventful, apart from the usual seasonable fog off Newfoundland and a shortage of Seaway pilots. Starman America berthed initially in the Government Docks in Sarnia to release the sea- fastenings and undertake the delicate job of positioning the off loading bogies underneath the main transportation saddles.
For the technically-minded, these were 2 x 12 axle Comettos, each weighing 74 tons. Once ready, the vessel moved to the offloading site where offloading with the aid of two enormous Kenworth trucks took just 24 minutes.
The whole through operation was under the direction of Starman personnel all the way and its success delighted everybody involved, especially the designers, fabricators, and ultimate consignee.
Starman America is now in Japan moving the eleven heaviest items for a new fertiliser plant being built in Sri Lanka. Two further voyages are planned to complete this major project. In the mean time, the vessel has been engaged on a contract carrying transformers in Canada and Newfoundland and has also transported sections of production platforms being built off the West Coast of Scotland.
Our other vessel in service, Starman Africa, has spent its initial voyages trading down to West Africa (apart from several short voyages around the UK coast). How ever, at the time of writing she is in Sweden, moving a 650-ton nuclear reactor, valued at 93m Swedish Kroner and representing four years’ building work. More about this interesting project in the next issue.

Superpesa found a new use for Starman (now Star of America). The ship was chartered to Kaiser, a brewery, and did promotional tours along the Brazilian coast. The main deck having been turned into a disco bar !

As of November 2005 she still appears to be owned by Superpesa Industrial of Brasil and appears on their front flash screen: