Nautilus Contracts for Seabed Mining Support Vessel

Nautilus Minerals has entered into a binding agreement with North Sea Shipping Holding AS, of Norway, for provision of a specialist mining support vessel for Nautilus’ Solwara 1 sea-floor mining project in Papua New Guinea. The ship will be supplied on a five-year charter basis, with options to extend for another five years. The contract is valued at about $125 million over the initial five-year period.

The vessel will be 160 m long and 30 m wide. Draft will be 7 m, and displacement will be 14,200 mt. Features will include a 400-mt, heave-compensated crane capable of working at 2,500 m water depth. Installed power will total 21 MW, sufficient to meet both ship and mining equipment demands. The vessel will accommodate 120 people and have a deck area of 2,900 m2 to accommodate the mining equipment.

As of late June 2008, hull fabrication was well advanced at RMK Marine in Tuzla, Turkey, south of Istanbul. On completion of hull fabrication in July 2009, the vessel will be outfitted by Astilleros Barreras at its Vigo yard in northern Spain, with completion scheduled for June 2010.

Nautilus Mining is headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia. Mine planning is proceeding for the company’s Solwara 1 sea-floor gold-copper mine under 1,500 m of water in the Bismarck Sea 50 km north of Rabaul township, Papua New Guinea.

Nautilus holds more than 365,000 km2 of tenement licenses and exploration applications in the territorial waters of Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Tonga, the Solomon Islands, and New Zealand. The company’s shareholders include Teck Cominco, 7.2%, and Anglo American, 5.7%.

As featured in Womp 08 Vol 6 - www.womp-int.com