GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - The Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC Cape Town) said a vessel spotted off the coast of Wilderness on Monday appears to be the semi-submersible heavy load carrier Boka Vanguard, en route from China to Brazil. They said the vessel will not be calling at any South African port.
Bob Hopkin, the resident from Wilderness who spotted the vessel, told George Herald he noticed it due south at about 09:00 on Monday 2 July.
"It was clearly very large although close to the horizon, which is some 40km from our house. It was unusual to see such a large ship so close as the main sea lanes around the Cape are 50 to 60km away and therefore over the horizon."
He assumed that it was closer to land due to the weather conditions and the high winds in particular. "Through my telescope, I could see it was a very unusual shape and not like a ship at all, but it seemed to have a ship sitting on top of it. I could read 'Boskalis' written on the side of it so I Googled that and found it to be a very large Dutch-based company specialising in, amongst others, salvage ships."
An app Hopkin has on his phone, "Marine Radar", uses the automatic identification system (AIS) to show the name and other details of the vessel.
It confirmed that the Boka Vanguard is en route from Qingdao in China to Rio de Janiero in Brazil and that the heavy lift vessel, owned by Dutch offshore giant Boskalis, is a semi-submersible vessel for heavy transport and offshore dry-docking, built by Hyundai Heavy Industries in Ulsan in 2012. It features a bow-less design which provides free deck space of 275 x 70m, extending the entire length of the vessel.
Hopkin said the Boka Vanguard took nearly all day to pass by Wilderness as it was doing just 4 knots.
An image of the Boka Vanguard, which was spotted passing the coast of Wilderness on Monday - and Mossel Bay on Tuesday - on its way to Brazil from China. Such big vessels are normally not visible from land, as they use sea lanes 50 - 60km away, over the horizon.
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