Strela Shiprepair celebrates ‘positive’ first year

Based in the new Volkswerft Stralsund Maritime Industrial and Commercial Park, the yard has more than doubled its workforce from an initial 20 to 45 and grown its order volume to 40 units.

“The strong demand for repair and maintenance services in our first year was challenging, but we coped well,” said Jan Tebbe-Simmendinger, one of three managing directors of Strela Shiprepair, who added that the team’s experience of traditional shipbuilding has helped the company succeed.

Strela Shiprepair was also able to cope with the rapidly growing order volume thanks to its multi-berthed quay and modern Syncrolift ship lift which can be used to dock ships of up to 260 metres.

“This shipyard system enabled us to work on seven ships at the same time in August, for example, on the slipway and at the shipyard quay,” explained Jan Tebbe-Simmendinger.

The yard is now one of the largest shipyards in this sector on the German coast. Around 90% of all ships scheduled for 2023 were docked, including a line of coastal motor vessel as well as special-purpose and passenger ships.

The repair and maintenance orders mainly involve work in the steel sector, mechanical engineering and on propeller and shaft systems. The first workboats were also added in the last quarter of the year when the yard took on crew transfer vessels destined for the offshore wind farms near Rügen.

Stralsund’s proximity to the Baltic Sea makes it attractive to the offshore wind industry and the company has set up a specialised workboat division to meet the anticipated growing demand.

The Harbour & Voyage Repairs department has also been established to react flexibly to requirements outside the Stralsund site with teams of up to ten technicians travelling to northern European harbours to carry out work on site.