Decks made toasty

JARED NICOLL

A Picton boat designer's latest challenge has been to come up with heating to help stop pilots slipping overboard working on frosty decks along the Chinese coast.

Naiad Design equipped two pilot boats with pads to help them operate in one of the busiest ports in the world, Qingdao.

The company drew up the plans for China-based boat builders Aurora, under contract from Port Qingdao, which included heated plates around the outside to stop the decks from becoming dangerously slippery while pilots are ferried to and from ships.

The boats, worth $1.6 million each, are equipped with two Caterpillar C12 490 horsepower engines and can travel up to 50kmh.

They were launched at Qingdao Port, Shandong Province, eastern China, at the end of April.

Naiad Design co-director and chief designer Steve Schmidt said the port could be hit by extreme conditions and the boats needed to be quick enough to improve efficiency but safe enough to avoid people falling overboard.

Qingdao Port was one of the busiest in the world and the pilot boats were being introduced to speed up transit times between large ships and the dock, he said.

"They needed heated outside decks because the pilots have to go out to climb up the ladder to get to their ships.

"They get pretty severe conditions and a lot of water washes over the deck; sometimes it gets covered in ice."

Read this article:
Decks made toasty