Prysmian’s Leonardo da Vinci cable-laying vessel has set a new local record for Middlesbrough as the largest offshore wind vessel ever to pass under town’s famous Transporter Bridge.
The vessel passed under the bridge when it completed its recent voyage to AV Dawson’s Port of Middlesbrough.
Peter Watson, Prysmian’s installation manager, said: “The vessel allows us to offer an ever wider and more versatile range of installation services and strengthen our leadership position in this highly competitive sector.”
The vessel’s first project was on the Viking Link project where she mobilised at Port of Middlesbrough.
The ship will be making regular visits to north-east England as Prysmian operates its Northern European marine base from Port of Middlesbrough.
Gary Dawson, AV Dawson’s managing director, said: “It was an amazing sight to watch the Leonardo da Vinci coming into berth at Port of Middlesbrough.
“It’s all been very top secret so we’ve not been allowed to talk about it until today, but now we really do want to tell the world as it just illustrates how Teesside and the River Tees is evolving to embrace and lead the way in exciting new industries such as offshore wind.
“Our relationship with Prysmian began with them having just a container of equipment on our site.
“In the last 10 years their Teesside based operation has grown at an incredible rate and they now rent a number of large warehouses on site and use our port to manage all their Northern European marine operations.”