For Royal Arctic Line and the experienced crew on board Malik Arctica, this is far from a new task. Since 2007, when Naja Arctica sailed the new research station Neumayer Station III on behalf of the German research institute Alfred Wegener Institut (AWI), the shipping company has, with the exception of one season, had a ship in Antarctica every year when winter and the ice has settled around Greenland. Malik Arctica’s sister ship, Mary Arctica, has supplied the Norwegian station Troll for the past 12 seasons, with occasional calls to the German and Belgian stations.
The agreement for this season is made with AWI and its broker in South Africa. The German station Neumayer III is located at Atka Bay, where supplies of fuel, food and various machinery will be shipped. Malik Arctica has loaded in Bremerhaven and after a stop in Cape Town where the last fresh supplies are loaded on board, the journey continues south, where a challenging task of unloading to the ice edge, which in some places can be up to 15 meters high, awaits. A single lift gets extra attention when handling a nearly 40-ton crane that will be used at the Neumayer III station for the next few years.
With the highest ice class for container ships and with a reinforced hull, Malik Arctica is especially suitable for this type of ice edge operations. Royal Arctic Line always ensures that crew members who have previously operated in the area are part of the expedition, so they can pass on their knowledge to crew members who are there for the first time. This ensures both top professional performance on the current voyage, and also that this core competence is retained in the company for the future – in an area of the globe where navigation and operations are particularly challenged by difficult ice and weather conditions.
– We are pleased and proud to once again be able to offer our customers in Antarctica our core competence of being able to operate in difficult-to-access Arctic regions. At the same time, we utilize available Greenlandic ship tonnage during a period of the year that is outside the normal busy season in Greenland, says Chief Commercial Officer, CCO Niels Clemensen, Royal Arctic Line.
For further information: Niels Clemensen, tel: +299 34 91 11, email: nic@ral.gl
