Farstad Shipping secures charter agreements

Contracts, Tenders and Rates - June 18, 2012

Farstad Shipping has been awarded the following charter contracts:

Statoil has awarded Farstad Shipping a long-term charter contract for two PSVs, each for a firm period of six years and 3 x 1 year options. The contracts will be served by two new builds. Shipbuilding contracts for the vessels will be signed in the near future. Commencement of the contracts is expected to be in the third and fourth quarters of 2014 respectively.

In Australia, Santos Australia Ltd has awarded PSV Lady Grete (2002, UT 755L, 3,271 dwt) and AHTS Far Saltire (2002, UT 728L, 16,320 bhp) a contract in support of their Nan Hai VI drilling operations on their Fletcher Finucane campaign. The approximate duration of the contract is 235 days with commencement in June.

Shell Australia has awarded a contract for the AHTS Far Stream (2006, UT 712L, 14,688 bhp) and AHTS Far Scimitar (2008, UT 712L, 14,688 bhp) for the Palta exploration project. The duration of this campaign is approximately three months commencing in August 2012. In addition Shell Australia has awarded their long term Prelude drilling support contracts to the PSV Far Spirit (2007, VS 470 MkII, 3,624 dwt), PSV TBN Far Skimmer (2012, STX PSV08 CD, 4,000 dwt) and PSV TBN Far Sitella (2013, STX PSV08 CD, 4,000 dwt). The durations for each vessel vary between approx 1.5 and 2.5 years with potential options to extend each by a further 200/300 days. Contract commencement for the two newbuilds will be immediately after delivery from the yard in Vietnam. Start up for PSV Far Spirit will be mid-August.

The total value of the contracts, excluding options, is approximately NKr 1.4 billion.