The Ministry of Defence is still considering a proposal from the Navy for construction of a dry-dock as part of the plans to augment warship repair infrastructure under the Naval Ship Repair Yard (Kochi), located at the Naval Base.
“It’s part of a 10-year plan to upgrade the NSRY(K) so as to enable it to support Indian naval ships of various classes operating in the vicinity in times of emergency,” Rear Admiral K. Ravi Kiran, Admiral Superintendent of NSRY(K) told The Hindu during an interaction.
Right now, the yard, which recently celebrated its 70{+t}{+h}anniversary, carries out periodic maintenance and complete refit of offshore patrol vessels, the sail training vessels, survey ships, research vessels, waterjet propelled patrol craft and training ships under the Southern Naval Command.
“In a year, the yard undertakes full refit of at least four big ships [patrol/supply] and repairs of some 40 ships of various classes. Given the fact that the training ships under the command make long-duration training voyages to South East Asia or the Middle East, they get bunched up for repair during lean periods. It’s a challenging task as we have to ensure that they sail for months on end without any issues,” he said.
Real estate stands in the way of the yard’s expansion plans. “There’s no space for expansion of the slipway. So, we are going vertically and are going to demolish sheds in the old yard. The dry-dock, measuring 140 m in length and 30 m wide, is proposed to be constructed at the present parade ground. Once realised, it will have the capacity to dock ships up to smaller destroyers,” said the Rear Admiral.
The Navy explored various options including construction of a floating dry-dock, but realised it would be a logistic nightmare given the narrowness of the channel in Kochi.
The yard has a workforce of over 850 civilians (1,056 is the sanctioned strength), 30 officers and 45 sailors at the moment. “The multi-skilled workforce is much sought after by visiting warships to resolve their issues.”
Maintaining that the yard’s strength lies in its skilled hands, the Rear Admirals said teams from the yard earned laurels at the national level for their quality of workmanship and innovation. “They are so good at innovating that the sculptures [of a stallion, robot] and the many mementos, replicas and statuettes stand testimony to their nimble hands.”
