King Arthur’s legendary sword, Excalibur is ready to fight!

Returning to Bach Dang Ship Yard, which is located in the northern port city of Hai Phong, my hometown with very funny feeling under the new “blue collar” shirt to attend M/V EXCALIBUR on 5^th Apr 2010 after my three weeks business trips in Saigon, Vung Tau and Ha Long bay to make sure everything was in order and if principal, Mediterranea di Navigazione S.p.A., an Italian Ravenna-based ship-owner had any further demands for their newborn vessel’s. She was about to depart for Singapore as her first voyage. The M/V Excalibur is the second in a series order of 4 LPG carriers placed by Mediterranea to Bach Dang Shipbuilding Industry Corp with connection made by Mearsk Broker, my friends and ex-partner. The delivery of their first two LPG carriers, King Arthur was on 27^th Jan 2011 and its sistership, Excalibur, has its keel laid in 2009 but technically delivered on 20^th Dec 2011 that were all much later than two parties’ expectation as contracted.

Excalibur was built by Bach Dang Shipyard with on site supports of designer, Marine Engineering Services of Trieste, Italy and surveillance of RINA Classification Society. To be constructed as a modern and highly sophisticated ethylene/LPG carrier 4,960DWT; LOA/Breadth/Draft: (m)104.0/16.0/7.50, Excalibur can carry two different products loaded, contained and discharged contemporarily with total capacity of 4500m³. Main engine Wartsila 8L32 - 4000kW can pushes vessel to reach maximum service speed at 15,3 knots which could be considered as the fastest Ethylene Carrier in the world for this size.

 

From the left, C/O Iacob Mihail, 1^st Eng Gheorghe Ionut (who got married with a Vietnamese lady and has served onboard both M/V King Arthur and Excalibur),

Eng. Boy Pasca Nicolae, behind  three Filipino Ratings

 

When I had my first step boarded, I saw a group of seafarers debating ebulliently about unreasonable automobile prices in Vietnam. It’s also a very hot issue to almost Vietnamese people. A hot guy made me surprised with his good English proficiency and deep knowledge about Vietnam controlling the talk, who then I knew was the first Eng. Officer, Gheorghe Ionut. It was lately understandable when he said “my wife is a Vietnamese” and has been working in Vietnam for a couple of years.

I joined the discussion by explanation for very high prices of automobile in Vietnamese market resulted from government’s protection given to automobile industry as it wants to gradually domesticize automobile’s component before WTO commitment comes into effect fully. In order to help domestic automobile industry government will strictly impose plenty of high taxes on exported cars, so the domestic can survive. However, this protectionism will not bring any benefit to local car consumers but make them hard to own a car, especially working class people.

After having a nice talk and double check with Chief Officer, all was in order, we just had to work on the draft and tide calendar to fix departure time. I took a leave with strong impression on a new vessel equipped with modern navigational equipment and devices, and gossiped with two officers during my walk to parking lot.

In standby time for Excalibur’s first voyage, I also tried to help a group of Filipino rating to transfer some money to their home country but it was impossible as the day later would be date of departure and they could not arrange shore-pass for crew. I have much sympathy for seafarers, who have to work onboard and far from home, especially rating as their salaries are much lower than operation and management officers. Taking an AB (Able Seaman) several banks to transfer a not very big amount of euro but it was unable when lacking of prerequisite docs, the Filipino AB seemed to sympathize with situation we had to face. Before returning to vessel, I took him for a drink, “chrysanthemum tea” – (“Trà cúc” – in Vietnamese) which is a pretty popular tea in the City of Flamboyant Flower (another name of Hai Phong Port City) but unique in Vietnam. We shared culture and some differences between two South East Asian countries during the tea, and what I did was just want to show foreigners Vietnamese’s friendliness and hospitality, it’s all from my heart. 

Excalibur then officially began her navigation at sea 10 days after my first attending. Thanks to Mediterranea has used our services and cannot wait for serving the third, another still un-named tanker sistership but the name may be related to King Arthur and his legendary sword, Excalibur.