Shipyards and dockyards are places which repair and build ships. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships. Dockyards are sometimes more associated with maintenance and basing activities than shipyards, which are sometimes associated more with initial construction. The terms are routinely used interchangeably, in part because the evolution of dockyards and shipyards has often caused them to change or merge roles.

Countries with large ship building industries include South Korea, Japan, China, Germany, Turkey, Poland and Croatia. The ship building industry tends to be more fragmented in Europe than in Asia. In European countries there are more smaller companies, compared to the fewer, larger companies in the ship building countries of Asia.

Most ship builders in the United States are privately owned, the largest being Northrop Grumman, a multi-billion dollar defense contractor. The publicly owned shipyards in the US are Naval facilities providing basing, support and repair.

Shipyards are constructed by the sea or by tidal rivers to allow easy access for their ships. In the United Kingdom, for example, shipyards were established on the River Thames (King Henry VIII founded yards at Woolwich and Deptford in 1512 and 1513 respectively), River Mersey, River Tees, River Tyne, River Wear and River Clyde - the latter growing to be the World's pre-eminent shipbuilding centre. Sir Alfred Yarrow established his yard by the Thames in London's Docklands in the late 19th century before moving it northwards to the banks of the Clyde at Scotstoun (1906-08). Other famous UK shipyards include the Harland and Wolff yard in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where the Titanic was built, and the naval dockyard at Chatham, England on the Medway in north Kent.

The site of a large shipyard will contain many specialised cranes, dry docks, slipways, dust-free warehouses, painting facilities and extremely large areas for fabrication of the ships.

After a ship's useful life is over, it makes its final voyage to a shipbreaking yard, often on a beach in South Asia. Historically shipbreaking was carried on in drydock in developed countries, but high wages and environmental regulations have resulted in movement of the industry to developing regions.

History

The world's earliest dockyards were built in the Harappan port city of Lothal circa 2400 BC in Gujarat, India. Lothal's dockyards connected to an ancient course of the Sabarmati river on the trade route between Harappan cities in Sindh and the peninsula of Saurashtra when the surrounding Kutch desert was a part of the Arabian Sea. Lothal engineers accorded high priority to the creation of a dockyard and a warehouse to serve the purposes of naval trade. The dock was built on the eastern flank of the town, and is regarded by archaeologists as an engineering feat of the highest order. It was located away from the main current of the river to avoid silting, but provided access to ships in high tide as well.

Ships were the first items to be manufactured in a factory, several hundred years before the Industrial Revolution, in the Venice Arsenal, Venice, Italy. The Arsenal apparently mass produced nearly one ship every day using pre-manufactured parts, and assembly lines and, at its height, employed 16,000 people.

Historic shipyards

• Lothal in Gujarat, India circa 2400 BC to 1900 BC
• Blackwall Yard 1614 to 1987
• Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Co. Ltd 1837 to 1912
• John Brown & Company 1851 to 1972
• Gdańsk Shipyard the birthplace of Solidarity Movement - (still a working yard)
• Swan Hunter - (closed in april 2006 and sold to Bharati Shipyards, India's second largest private sector shipbuilder)
• Harland and Wolff - (still a working yard)
• Cammell Laird - (still a working repair yard)
• Blohm + Voss, where the Bismarck was constructed (still a major yard)
• Royal Naval Dockyards in the UK (including Woolwich, Deptford, Chatham, Portsmouth and Devonport), Gibraltar, Bombay, Bermuda, Hong Kong and elsewhere worldwide
• Bethlehem Steel Corporation had 15 shipyards during World War II
  • Staten Island Shipyard 1895
• Charlestown Navy Yard, later Boston Navy Yard, Boston, Massachusetts 1800 to 1974
• Ulstein Verft, Norway, established in 1917 (still a working yard under the Ulstein Group)
• Navy Island, Ontario, Canada - French in 1700s, then British 1763 to War of 1812
• Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Mare Island, California 1854 to 1996
• New York Naval Shipyard (NYNSY), also known as the Brooklyn Navy Yard, the New York Navy Yard, and United States Navy Yard, New York 1801 to 1966
• Philadelphia Naval Shipyard 1799 to 1965
• San Francisco Naval Shipyard, later Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, then Treasure Island Naval Station Hunters Point Annex, 1941 to 1994
• Potrero Point San Francisco California 1880s - still a working yard
• Long Beach Naval Shipyard 1943 to 1997
• Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Located on Maine,New Hampshire border Operatinal:1800 to present making it the oldest continuously-operating shipyard of the US Navy.
• Chantiers de l'Atlantique(Aker Yard France) - established in 1861 (still a working yard)
• 3. Maj - One of the largest shipyard in Mediterranean, established in 1892 in Rijeka (still a working yard)

Prominent dockyards and shipyards

• ABG Shipyard Ltd,Mumbai
• BAE Systems Naval Ships and BAE Systems Submarines (formally merged under BAE Systems Marine), are subsidiaries of the global defence contractor BAE Systems, and form Europe's largest naval shipbuilding group. BAE currently operates three shipyards in the United Kingdom; two large Shipbuilding yards on the River Clyde in Glasgow, Scotland - the Naval Ships division which specialises in surface shipbuilding projects like the Type 45 destroyer - and the BAE Systems Submarines Submarine Centre of Excellence at Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria, England. The latter is one of the few yards in the world capable of building nuclear submarines, like the Royal Navy's . BAE Systems is currently leading the "Carrier Alliance" to design and build the Future Aircraft Carriers for the Royal Navy, which will be Europe's largest naval shipbuilding project.
• Northrop Grumman Newport News, (formerly Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Company) is the largest private ship builder in the US and the one best known for its unique capacity to build the s.

• Cochin Shipyard is the largest shipyard in India. Currently an aircraft carrier, the Indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC) is under construction at Cochin shipyard.

• Devonport Dockyard http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/2002476.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1422130.stm, located in the city of Plymouth, England in the county of Devon is the largest naval base in Western Europe. It has 15 dry docks, four miles (6 km) of waterfront, 25 tidal berths, five basins and covers 650 acres (2.6 km²). It is the main refitting base for Royal Navy nuclear submarines and also handles work on frigates. It is the base for seven of the Trafalgar class nuclear powered hunter-killer submarines and many frigates, exploiting its convenient access to the Atlantic Ocean. It supports the Vanguard class Trident missile nuclear ballistic missile submarines in a custom-built refitting dock. It houses the , a nuclear powered submarine used in the Falklands War and open to the general publichttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/1695215.stm. Facilities in the local area also include a major naval training establishment and a base for the Royal Marines.

• Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers is located in India. It is owned by the Government of India and is constructing the Shardul class Large landing ship tank for the Indian Navy.

• Hyundai Heavy Industries Ulsan Shipyard, in South Korea, is currently the largest in the world and has the capability to build a variety of vessels including Commercial Cargo, Offshore and Naval vessels.

• Ingalls Shipbuilding, part of Northrop Grumman's Northrop Grumman Ship Systems sector, located in Pascagoula, Mississippi repaired the USS Cole and builds offshore drilling rigs, cruise ships and naval vessels.

• Mazagaon Dockyard, operated by state-owned Mazagaon Dock Limited, is one of India's largest shipyards. It constructs a variety of ships both for the defence and civilian sector. The dockyard is known for constructing Britain's . Currently the shipyard is building three Shivalik class frigates and three Kolkata class destroyers for the Indian Navy.

• Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia, is one of the largest shipyards in the world; specializing in repairing, overhauling and modernizing ships and submarines. It's the oldest and largest industrial facility that belongs to the United States Navy

• The Portland, Oregon shipyard, operated by Cascade General Ship Repair is the largest such facility on the United States West Coast.

• Yantai Raffles http://www.yantai-raffles.com/ is the largest ship builder in China located in Yantai. It has built numerous cargo ships, tugboats and support vessels, as well as pleasure vessels such as yachts.

• The beach at Alang in the Indian state of Gujarat is the site of a large complex of shipbreaking yards which processes 50% of the ships that are salvaged.

• Karachi Shipyard http://www.karachishipyard.com.pk is the only shipbuilding company in Pakistan located in Karachi. It has built numerous cargo ships, tugboats and support vessels, Naval vessels, submarines and Frigates.

See also

• List of shipbuilders and shipyards

External links

• Sea Your History - Website from the Royal Naval Museum - Discover detailed information about Portsmouth Dockyard and the Royal Navy in the 20th Century.
• U.S. Shipyards - extensive collection of information about U. S. shipyards, including over 500 pages of U. S. shipyard construction records
• Trading Places - interactive history of European dockyards
• Shipyards United States - from GlobalSecurity.org

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