30/07/2026
In 2026, we have spent a lot of time on site on the remote outer islands of Kiribati, deploying AtoN as part of our project scope for Hall Contracting on their outer islands infrastructure project in the Republic of Kiribati, which is an initiative of the Government of Kiribati, and financed by the World Bank Group and Asian Development Bank.
We recently installed the last shallow water AtoN for this project in the extensive lagoon surrounding the beautiful island of Abaiang. The project has included the design, manufacturing and installation of a total 7 x floating AtoN (buoys) and 36 x shallow water beacons across 3 x different outer islands.
This has been a unique, challenging and rewarding project experience, and there is a lot to reflect on, and a few things we have been reminded of:
𝟭. 𝗜𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸 𝗼𝘂𝘁𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗼𝘅. The unique scope of the shallow water beacons required structures that could be manually installed with locally available resources, whilst also being designed in compliance with internationally recognised design standards, using very location-specific environmental and metocean data. This required us to disregard many of the commonly accepted approaches to shallow water AtoN and draw on an accumulation of experience to come up with a practical, compliant design that would provide reliable, high-quality AtoN for local, inter-island and international shipping. We had the pleasure of working with the team at Arup and Hall Contracting, for a professional and open-dialogue approach to the design, whilst MSM - Mediterráneo Señales Marítimas provided design input in addition to the manufacturing of the equipment. Proof is always in the pudding, and the success of the installation program is testament to the time spent on design.
𝟮. 𝗣𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴. We had the pleasure of working with different teams and groups of people at various stages of the project - from the initial site visits with the in-country project management team, the design process with Arup and MSM, the constant support and teamwork with the Hall Contracting team, through to working with the marine department and our crews of local community members for the installation. The outcome is reliable AtoN infrastructure designed and built for high performance in very remote conditions, which would not have been possible without teams and individuals heavily invested in the success of the concept and the project.
𝟯. 𝗥𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝗮𝗶𝗻’𝘁 𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘆. Kiribati is one of the most pristine, remote marine environments in the world. It has 33 atolls, 1.3 million square miles of ocean and – fun fact – is the only country situated in all four hemispheres. Working efficiently in these types of environments requires experience, autonomous and efficient site setups and very complex logistics, and we were fortunate to team up with Hall Contracting, who are remote site infrastructure experts.
