Port of Paranaguá welcomes navy ship to assist Army training exercise

The beacon ship Faroleiro Mario Seixas, belonging to the Brazilian Navy, made berth at the Port of Paranaguá on Wednesday (16) to support an exercise organized by the Army Reserve Officer Training Course. The goal is to facilitate the transportation of instructors and 20 students from the 20th Armored Infantry Battalion (20th BIB), headquartered in Curitiba, to Ilha do Mel, where they will then disembark into the water.

“This presents a significant opportunity for a collaborative operation between the Brazilian Army and Navy in Paranaguá,” emphasizes Captain Lieutenant Patrick Venâncio, the ship’s first mate.

The ship cast off from the dock by late morning this Wednesday, with the crew on board, and is set to return to Paranaguá with students and instructors on Friday (18).

While the vessel is typically berthed at the headquarters of the Captaincy of the Ports of Paranaguá (CPPR) and dedicated to beaconing across the entire access channel to the ports of Paraná, this exercise has drawn it to berth 205 at the Port of Paranaguá. Notably smaller compared to other vessels that frequent the port, it has garnered the full attention of the port authority for this undertaking, where solid bulk is usually handled daily for import and export.

Captain-Lieutenant Harrisson Campos Júnior, the ship’s commander, elaborates, “The beacon ship’s primary role is to engage in nautical signaling activities, involving the installation, maintenance, and replacement of nautical signals such as navigation buoys.”

“We have a whole technical apparatus, the main one being the loader, a device located in the bow, used to place buoys that can weight at least 1 ton”, he details.

The beacon ship Faroleiro Mario Seixas was officially commissioned into the Brazilian Navy on January 31, 1984. Measuring 35.5 meters in length (loa), 6.7 meters in width (beam), and boasting a draft of 3.8 meters, the vessel is named in honor of Mario Seixas, a public official and agent of river maritime activities. Seixas distinguished himself over a span of more than 40 years, rendering invaluable surveillance services during World War II.

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