New Zealand's first open ocean salmon farm has a vessel purpose-built to keep it running. Whekenui, a steel workboat just under 24 metres in length, arrived in Marlborough in October and is already operating out of Picton as the primary service vessel for Blue Endeavour, New Zealand King Salmon's offshore pilot farm.
The farm sits seven kilometres off Cape Lambert, beyond the shelter of the Marlborough Sounds, in genuinely exposed open water. That location is what makes the project historically significant. No salmon farming in New Zealand has been attempted in conditions like these, and it is precisely that exposure which demanded a vessel with serious capability rather than simply adequate capacity.
Whekenui was designed by Southern Ocean Solutions, an Australian-owned marine design, construction, and service company, and built at Z189 Shipyard in Vietnam. She measures 23.9 metres overall, with a 9.2-metre beam and a depth of 3.5 metres. At a carrying capacity of more than 100 tonnes, she is as much infrastructure as she is vessel. There is nothing incidental about her presence at Blue Endeavour. She is the daily operational link between shore and site.
The hull form prioritises performance in difficult conditions. Twin Cummins N855 diesel engines push her to a working cruise of around 10 knots, with a maximum of 11.3 knots. Bollard pull sits at approximately nine tonnes, and a Schottel 100kW bow thruster gives her the close-quarters control required when manoeuvring around pens, moorings, and barges in a swell.
Her working deck reflects the breadth of what Blue Endeavour requires day to day. A Palfinger Marine PK41002MD crane provides full coverage across the deck. Hydraulic hatches reduce the manual handling burden on crew. An integrated Akva feed system handles feed transport and discharge, while dedicated mort recovery equipment addresses one of the more demanding routine tasks in any aquaculture operation. Data retrieval, mooring support, crew transfer, and power supply round out the vessel's regular duties. She is expected to keep working when smaller boats cannot.
Whekenui is a working vessel through and through, yet there is a purposeful tidiness to her lines that sets her apart from the purely utilitarian.
Accommodation for five crew is self-contained and functional. On a farm this far offshore, operational independence matters.
Whekenui is currently supporting the final build-out phase of Blue Endeavour, including installation of the offshore mooring grid and the transfer of salmon from inshore nursery pens into the offshore system. As operations scale up, her role at the centre of daily farm life will only grow.
Whekenui | Technical overview
- Owner: New Zealand King Salmon - Role: Open ocean aquaculture service vessel - Designer: Southern Ocean Solutions - Builder: Z189 Shipyard, Vietnam - Length overall: 23.9m - Beam: 9.2m - Depth: 3.5m - Construction: Steel - Cargo capacity: 100 tonnes - Main engines: 2 × Cummins N855 diesel - Cruising speed: 10 knots - Maximum speed: 11.3 knots - Bollard pull: approx. 9 tonnes - Bow thruster: Schottel 100kW - Crane: Palfinger Marine PK41002MD - Crew: 5
