VESSEL REVIEW | Papy Charles – French-built oyster harvesting boat with amphibious capability

French shipbuilder Chantier Naval Delavergne has delivered a new oyster harvesting vessel to the Beaulieu family of Brittany for operation by their La Belon de Cancale oyster farming business.

Designed by naval architecture firm Herskovits and Tobie (H&T), the all-aluminium newbuild has been christened Papy Charles ("Grandfather Charles") after Charles Beaulieu, who had helped start the family's oyster harvesting business in 1987, the same business that is now being run by his five children. Construction on the vessel had been underway for three months when Charles sadly died in December 2021 at age 67.

The new vessel replaces Ostrea-Edulis, a 1991-built harvesting boat in the same owner's fleet. Papy Charles boasts a greater carrying capacity, allowing for fewer trips to be made during a typical eight-week harvesting cycle. Whereas Ostrea-Edulis needed to complete 118 trips to fulfill quotas over eight weeks, the newbuild can achieve the same figures while completing only 71 trips.

The boat is also notable for being an amphibious vessel, having been fitted with a set of lifting and driving wheels to also allow limited operation on land.

The boat has an LOA of 21.6 metres, a beam of 6.3 metres, three deck cranes, two stern-mounted oyster dredges, capacity for 20 tonnes of cargo distributed across 50 boxes, and a hybrid electric propulsion arrangement consisting of a Volvo Penta D8 IMO Tier III engine and a hydraulic thruster. The engine, which can deliver a speed of seven knots even at full load, is configured to run on fuel oil mixed with an additive that will help reduce NOx emissions.

The cranes draw power from onboard batteries to free up the main engine for navigation. The batteries also supply power for the communication and navigation electronics, which include equipment from Furuno and Simrad.

Papy Charles is homeported in Vivier-sur-Mer and will be operated primarily in the Brittany commune of Cancale, particularly in the Bay of Mont Saint-Michel where it will harvest flat and deep-water hollow oysters.