Eastern Shipbuilding Group, the prime contractor on the US Coast Guard Offshore Patrol Cutter program, recently awarded Schoellhorn-Albrecht a contract for the design and manufacture of equipment for the cutters.
According to a Schoellhorn-Albrecht announcement, the company will be responsible for delivery of deck machinery, fittings, accommodation ladder system and structural castings including the shaft strut and stern tube.
The OPC is the US Coast Guard’s largest shipbuilding program under which 11 OPC’s are to be built to replace the medium endurance cutters. The OPC provides a capability bridge between the national security cutter which patrols the open ocean and the fast response cutter which patrols closer to shore.
“Schoellhorn-Albrecht is very proud to be selected as a major supplier to Eastern Shipbuilding Group” says Brian Pavlisin, president. “This contract represents a culmination of years of development our team has put into this project on every major Schoellhorn-Albrecht product. We look forward to delivering and integrating our products into this new OPC and working with the fantastic team at Eastern Shipbuilding Group,” Pavlisin says.
The new Offshore Patrol Cutters will be built at ESG’s shipbuilding facility in Panama City, Florida. Construction is set to begin in 2018 with delivery of the first vessel scheduled for 2021.
The first 11 cutters that are set to start deliveries in fiscal year 2021 will be named Argus, Chase, Ingham, Pickering, Rush, Icarus, Active, Diligence, Alert, Vigilant and Reliance.