Hyundai Heavy's moving bridge design recognized
Yoon Moon-kyoon, left, Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) senior executive vice president, receives the Approval in Principle certificate from DNV GL’s CEO Svensen for the compnay’s innovative SkyBench concept, at the Nor-Shipping exhibition in Oslo, Norway. / Courtesy of HHI
By Park Jin-hai
Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) has received a certificate for an innovative moving bridge design it developed to increase cargo space on container vessels in Norway, the company said Thursday.
The company’s SkyBench concept makes the cabin of a cargo vessel ― comprised of a bridge and three upper decks ― mobile by mounting it on rails.
By using the void beneath the sliding block for additional storage, as well as resizing and repositioning fuel tanks, room is created for additional cargo.
The design received an Approval in Principle (AiP) certificate from classification society DNV GL.
“It is the world’s first concept that broke the stereotype that the bridge should be fixed on to the body of the vessel,” said a company official.
If the 19,000 TEU very large container ships adopt this design, they can store 450 more containers, according to the company.
“Those container ships can earn an additional 2.7 billion won each year. When it is summed up to the average lifecycle of 25 years, the operator of the container can expect an extra 67 billion won by adopting our design,” added the official.
The SkyBench mechanism takes 10 minutes to operate.
On top of increased cargo space, the sliding block is detachable and is designed to float independently of the vessel in an emergency.
“As we have been doing over the past four decades, we will continue to provide competitive ships differentiated from others in terms of quality, reliability and technological capabilities to our valued clients,” said Yoon Moon-kyoon, HHI senior executive vice president & COO of shipbuilding division. “I believe that SkyBench, like many other previous technological breakthroughs we have shown to the world, will surely bring benefits to our customers.”