When the Viking Sky lost power in a storm off the coast of Norway this weekend, the 5,000 DWT geared lumber carrier Hagland Captain responded to the distress call and diverted to assist the cruise ship. The lumber carrier, however, would soon also need to be rescued.

During the helicopter evacuation of the cruise ship’s passengers, two of the five rescue helicopters were briefly called away to rescue the nine crew of the Hagland Captain. The lumber carrier was roughly 5 NM miles away from the Viking Sky when it too lost power in the storm. The crew was rescued and the ship itself was later towed to safety. 

The Haglund Captain is an interesting ship in her own right. In December of 2018, Wärtsilä signed an agreement with Hagland Shipping AS to retrofit the Haglund Captain with a Wärtsilä battery hybrid propulsion system. The retrofit will be the first project of its kind ever in short-sea shipping applications. 

New battery capacity will be sufficient to sail in and out of a harbor on electric power for approximately 30 minutes, which will effectively reduce noise and pollution levels in the vicinity of the port. A shore power connection will provide power for loading/unloading operations and for battery charging, while a new reduction gear with power take-off and power take-in technology will be installed, as well as a Wärtsilä NOx reducer. Wärtsilä estimates that the total reduction in NOx emissions after the retrofit could be as much as 80 to 90 percent, while overall fuel cost savings are expected to be in the range of 5 to 10 percent.

It is unclear whether the ship has been retrofit with the new equipment and if so whether it had anything to do with the power failure. Given the time frame, it seems likely that the retrofit has yet to be undertaken. Fortunately, the ship survived the storm.  Thanks to Walter S. for contributing to this post.