Prysmian’s Monna Lisa ready for assembly, set to hit the water in March

Prysmian’s new cable-laying vessel Monna Lisa has reached the hull erection stage, marking the start of assembly and preparing to be launched into the water.

The addition of Monna Lisa will expand Prysmian’s installation fleet to six cable-laying vessels and will have installed the same main equipment and early implementation of lessons learned from the construction of Leonardo da Vinci.

Monna Lisa is set to match the capacity and performance of Leonardo da Vinci while incorporating some green improvements such as lower C02 emissions thanks to the high-voltage shore connection to power the vessel with clean energy during loading operation, a 3MWh energy storage system with double the battery capacity and diesel generators ready for biodiesel blends.

“Being the second vessel, we can see the improvements in the design and construction, together with a high level of outfitting already tested with Leonardo da Vinci,” Davide Leoni, Project Manager for Monna Lisa at Prysmian.

“One lesson learned from the previous project is how to improve the collaboration with the yard and the wider project team. We are working in a very good environment with the yard and all the stakeholders involved and trying to find effective solutions to any challenges that we come across.”

A keel-laying ceremony was held in Tulcea in April to mark the birth of the new vessel built by the VARD Group.

Erecting the hull includes assembling steel blocks in the final hull form and welding them together. So far all 9137 tons of steel have been cut and prefabricated and 70% of the steel weight has been pre-erected.

“The hull erection means that we are starting to assemble the vessel for the launching. From that moment onwards, Monna Lisa will be afloat in the water,” said Leoni said.

According to Prysmian, an average of about 600-700 people per day have been working on the construction in the shipyard up to now, and that number is likely to steadily increase.

Some of the key equipment is also being installed at this stage, such as the generators, thruster units and the capstan. The hull structure is taking shape on the erection platform, from which the entire vessel will later be moved onto the Atlante floatable dry dock for the launching operation.

The launch is scheduled for March 2024.