The first exclusively owned dredger ship of its type in the

Indian Navy The Indian Navy (IN) (ISO 15919, ISO: ) is the Navy, maritime and Amphibious warfare, amphibious branch of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Navy. The Chief of the Naval Staff (India), Chief ...

; the indigenously built ship is meant for

dredging Dredging is the excavation of material from a water environment. Possible reasons for dredging include improving existing water features; reshaping land and water features to alter drainage, navigability, and commercial use; constructing d ...

the various navy ports. The ship was designed to meet precise deepening requirements around the

dockyard A shipyard, also called a dockyard or boatyard, is a place where ships are built and repaired. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships. Compared to shipyards, which are sometimes more involve ...

and port installations and in

riverine A river is a natural stream of fresh water that flows on land or inside caves towards another body of water at a lower elevation, such as an ocean, lake, or another river. A river may run dry before reaching the end of its course if it run ...

or other places where deepening is needed. The ship which can hold up to 300 cubic metres or 500 tons of dredged material, has a set of 8 openable hopper bottom doors for disposal of dredged material out at

sea A sea is a large body of salt water. There are particular seas and the sea. The sea commonly refers to the ocean, the interconnected body of seawaters that spans most of Earth. Particular seas are either marginal seas, second-order section ...

. The main equipment of the ship is a 320-HP Cummins-855-powered forward-mounted crane supplied by Titagarth Wagons. The crane’s 15.2-meter boom has a working

radius In classical geometry, a radius (: radii or radiuses) of a circle or sphere is any of the line segments from its Centre (geometry), center to its perimeter, and in more modern usage, it is also their length. The radius of a regular polygon is th ...

of 12 meters and hoisting capacity of 10.5 metric tons at a 46-degree boom angle. The crane’s grab bucket has 3-cubic-meter capacity and holds up to 4.5 metric tons of dredged material; and is capable of dredging up to depths of 10 meters. Built by

Tebma Shipyard Limited Tebma Shipyards Limited is a Chennai based shipbuilding company in India. The company has delivered more than 150 vessels, mainly offshore support vessels. It was shut down in June 2021 due to various reasons. History Tebma was incorporated in 1 ...

, the ship based out of

Mumbai Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial capital and the most populous city proper of India with an estimated population of 12 ...

has a 90% locally sourced content, much more than the usual 50% thanks to the Make in India initiative started by PM

Narendra Modi Narendra Damodardas Modi (born 17 September 1950) is an Indian politician who has served as the Prime Minister of India, prime minister of India since 2014. Modi was the chief minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014 and is the Member of Par ...

. The dredger built at Tebma's

Malpe Malpe is a natural port in the Udupi District in Karnataka, India. Located at the mouth of the Malpe River about six kilometers to the west of Udupi, it is an important port and a major fishing harbor on the Karnataka coast. The town of Malpe i ...

facility in

Karnataka Karnataka ( ) is a States and union territories of India, state in the southwestern region of India. It was Unification of Karnataka, formed as Mysore State on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, States Re ...

is a self-propelled grab-hopper dredger that can discharge dredged material through eight hopper doors controlled by

hydraulic Hydraulics () is a technology and applied science using engineering, chemistry, and other sciences involving the mechanical properties and use of liquids. At a very basic level, hydraulics is the liquid counterpart of pneumatics, which concer ...

rams and chains over

pulley Sheave without a rope A pulley is a wheel on an axle or shaft enabling a taut cable or belt passing over the wheel to move and change direction, or transfer power between itself and a shaft. A pulley may have a groove or grooves between flan ...

out at sea. Grab-hopper dredgers generally produce minimal

turbidity Turbidity is the cloudiness or haziness of a fluid caused by large numbers of individual particles that are generally invisible to the naked eye, similar to smoke in air. The measurement of turbidity is a key test of both water clarity and wa ...

and less disturbance to

marine ecosystem Marine ecosystems are the largest of Earth's aquatic ecosystems and exist in Saline water, waters that have a high salt content. These systems contrast with freshwater ecosystems, which have a lower salt content. Marine waters cover more than 7 ...

. Indian Navy which used to outsource its dredging operations had floated a tender for its 1st exclusively owned dredger in 2012, and Tebma shipyard had won the bid in 2013. This dredger is the 22nd vessel built by the company for the Indian Navy, having previously supplied tugs and special purposes

barges A barge is typically a flat-bottomed vessel which does not have its own means of mechanical propulsion. Original use was on inland waterways, while modern use is on both inland and marine water environments. The first modern barges were pull ...

References

{{Reflist 2010 ships Auxiliary ships of the Indian Navy Dredgers

See also

References