Northern Offshore’s jack-up rig kicks off drilling operations in Qatar

A Northern Offshore-owned drilling rig Energy Enticer has started drilling operations with Qatargas.

The Energy Enticer is a jack-up drilling rig of a GustoMSC CJ50 design.

The Energy Enticer rig had a successful mobilization to Qatar Petroleum’s North Field in early September 2020 despite recent global industry challenges, Northern Offshore said on Wednesday.

It is the first of three drilling units to start long-term contracts with Qatargas on behalf of Qatar Petroleum.

Chairman and CEO, Dr. Yuanhui Sun, stated: “We are very proud to announce this significant milestone in the history of Northern Offshore.

“The superior level of commitment shared by our customer, Qatar Petroleum, and Northern Offshore’s rig-based and onshore teams has allowed us to successfully overcome the uncertainty and operational challenges from Covid-19 and focus on delivering the first of our four high specification new build jack-ups into the Middle East region”.

Northern Offshore signed letters of award for two long-term contracts for its newbuild jack-up rigs Energy Enticer and Energy Edge with Qatar Petroleum back in May 2019.

At the time of the award, both rigs were under construction at Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipyard in China. Each of these drilling units was awarded four-year firm contracts (plus options).

They were initially expected to start working in Qatar in April 2020 and June 2020, respectively.