Delays: at Al Shaheen
Maersk bins Al Shaheen FSO gig
Maersk Oil has scrapped the contract for the floating storage and offloading vessel FSO Africa, which was due to go into service on the Al Shaheen field, off Qatar, saying that the delayed delivery of the vessel was unacceptable.
The vessel - which was due for delivery on 19 January - is still under construction. Euronav said its 50/50 joint venture with OSG had received the notice of termination from Maersk's Qatar unit.
OSG later released a statement saying that it and Euronav contested Maersk's right to terminate the contract.
However, Maersk Oil's Karsten Jensen told Upstream: "Maersk Oil Qatar is within its contractual rights to cancel the contract although all terms and conditions are confidential."
Jensen added: "The FSO Africa’s contractual delivery date was 21 September 2009. Delivery has still not taken place and further delay is foreseen.
"Maersk does not consider these ongoing delays to be acceptable and has therefore cancelled the contract with immediate effect."
The Euronav/OSG venture operates the FSO Asia, which was also delivered behind schedule. The FSO Asia is on site at Al Shaheen and is currently being hooked up and commissioned.
Upstream earlier reported that if the Euronav-OSG venture failed to deliver the FSO Africa by 19 January, Maersk was considering exercising its right to terminate one or both FSO service contracts.