Van Oord adds new trencher to fleet for cable burial

The Dutch company Van Oord has introduced a new trencher, Jet-It, to its subsea cable burial fleet. The unit has completed testing in the North Sea and is now ready for deployment.

Jet-It joins the company’s two existing trenchers, Dig-It and Deep Dig-It, which use both mechanical cutting and jetting. Unlike its predecessors, Jet-It is said to rely solely on high-pressure water jetting to fluidise the seabed and create trenches.

“Following a successful test campaign in the North Sea, this state-of-the-art machine is now ready for its first project,” Van Oord said in a social media post.

“Designed for fast mobilisation, the Jet-It can be deployed on any vessel in a single lift, saving both time and costs.”

According to the company, Jet-It is optimised for sandy and light clay soils and can achieve trenching depths of up to three metres. It features two frequency-driven water pumps and multiple integrated sensors to enable high-speed, precise operations.

The system is said to be tailored for the burial of inter-array and export cables and supports more efficient subsea cable installation.

“With the arrival of Jet-It, we now operate three trenchers, all designed for the purpose of cable burial,” the company noted.

Just recently, Van Oord awarded SPIE Wind Connect a contract for the termination and testing of inter-array cables at Ecowende’s offshore wind farm, located at Hollandse Kust (west) lot VI in the Netherlands.