The most basic function of any shipping agency Malaysia provides is to transport goods from one place to another with proper treatments maintaining the item’s optimal conditions. Besides other ordinary goods that support daily needs, shipping agency Malaysia also has to transport other more implicit life-sustaining goods like oils, gases, or other marine resources. Most of these marine resources are exploited or mined from offshore platforms  

Drilling Barges

Commonly used for shallow water drilling, drilling barges are normally built in areas such as lakes, swamps, rivers, and canals. they are gigantic floating platforms towed by tugboats to move from one place to another. Due to this mobilisation drilling barges are not suitable for stormy or rough sea areas as they could easily be dragged away and flipped over by the waves. 

Jackup platforms

Similar to drilling barges, Jackup platforms are also movable with tugboats towing the platforms from one place to another. However, when the jack-up rig entered the drilling site, it could fix itself with a set of three or four legs equipped on its body. These legs will slowly lower down until they touch the sea bed. Nonetheless, this also added to the reasons why this platform is only suitable for shallow water as it is impractical to extend these legs deep down the ocean. The maximum operation for this kind of offshore platform is 500 feet in depth. Additionally, since these jack up platforms are secured with mechanical legs, they are safer for people to operate than drilling barges. 

Semi-submersible platforms

This is a rather special platform as it is an offshore oil rig that consists of a drill unit that is made up of columns and pontoons that when flooded with water will make the pontoons submerge to a predetermined depth. This is the most popular type of offshore platform as they have both the advantages of submersible rigs with the power to drill in deep water. Semi-submersible platforms shared the same working principles as submersible rigs with the “inflating” and “deflating” of the platform’s lower hull. This allows the rig to be partially submerged, floating above the drill site, enhancing its stability by letting the water fill the lower hull. Rigs of this kind will normally be fixed by a set of huge anchors with each of them weighing up to 10 tons. This set of anchors will be accompanied by the submerged parts of the rigs to keep the platform stable for use in rough or stormy offshore conditions. 

Drillships

Just as the name indicates, drillships are designed for drilling missions as these ships will help carry the drilling platforms to the drilling sites, often deep-sea locations. This kind of ship has everything a normal large ocean ship should have. Only that they have a drilling platform located in the middle of the boat with a hole that runs across the ship to its hull, for the shrill string to extend through the boat, called a “moonpool”. Drillships could operate in very deep seas as they are equipped with a “dynamic positioning” system. Allows them to propel in any direction with the help of an electric motor that is integrated into the drillship’s computer that is connected to the satellite positioning technology in combination with sensors installed on the drilling template.