Penzance Dry Dock will undergo a major refurbishment after securing £2m. The oldest operational tidal dry dock in Europe was acquired in 2021 by Jamie Murphy, a former Royal Navy marine engineer, after facing closure.
Mr Murphy, whose grandfather worked at the dock for 45 years, is hoping to transform the facility from a repair business to a shipbuilding company, training up apprentices in the trade.
He secured the cash injection from the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme towards a £4m upgrade of the business.
The revamp includes an overhaul of the dry dock gates, which is already completed, and a new pumping system that can empty the dock of 4,500 cubic metres of water in an hour instead of six.
There will be seven new cranes, including five gantry cranes inside, plus a 10-tonne jib crane outside and a 50-tonne Goliath crane rising 20m over the dry dock, transforming its capabilities.
The carpenter’s workshop is also being replaced with a new building with staff toilets and showers, and a ‘clean room’ for conducting engine and gearbox overhauls. There will be new concrete floors across the entire site, with 130 piles to improve ground conditions. The workshops will become fully enclosed to reduce noise and the machine shop will have new CNC profiling machines.
The refurb also includes a large project office, CAD drawing office, apprenticeship suite and new heating, drainage and double glazing.
Mr Murphy said: “The Good Growth funding has been vital in enabling major capital investment right across the site which is going to be transformational for Penzance Dry Dock.
“The more diverse and agile the facility is, the more we can deliver in the markets we want to be in, and I think we could easily employ more than 100 people. We want to attract more employment to the area while protecting the future of our industry here in West Cornwall.”
The dock recently secured its first Ministry of Defence contract in 28 years. The business is also eyeing other opportunities including the marine engineering requirements of building and maintaining the floating offshore windfarms planned for the Celtic Sea.
This month a new intake of apprentices will join the business, and in January the dry dock will welcome the Scillonian III passenger ferry for its annual refit.
The Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme is a £137m local investment fund managed by Cornwall Council and funded by the Government’s UK Shared Prosperity Fund.
Cllr Louis Gardner, Cornwall Council portfolio holder for economy, added: “The dock’s transformation will create high-quality jobs, develop crucial skills, and position West Cornwall as a leader in marine engineering – a sector critical to the region’s prosperity, particularly with the emerging opportunities in offshore wind. It’s fantastic to see such an iconic site thrive once more and contribute to the long-term growth of Cornwall’s economy.”