WesWorld

Belgian Shipbuilding Companies
Belgium has a small shipbuilding industry but today it is equipped with modern tooling and can build a variety of merchant and naval vessels to modern standards.


Beiliard S.A.
Shipbuilder based in Ostend with two slips and a small dry dock.

Boelwerf S.A.
Initially founded by Bernard Boel in 1829 at Temse on the Scheldt. Bernard was originally a carpenter in the shipyards in Antwerp south. He was succeeded by his son Joseph Boe, the company becoming J. Boel & Sons. The first fifty years the yard built wooden ships at an average of one ship per year. From 1900 the yard began to build steel ships and the rate of production began to rise and the yard has slowly expanded ever since.

Société Anonyme John Cockerill
In 1817, John Cockerill founded with his brother James the Société Cockerill in Seraing. They built a wharf on the Meuse in 1820. Because of good business relations with William of Orange and the shipbuilding industry in the Northern Netherlands, Cockerill acquired the de facto monopoly on the supply of steam boilers and machinery for the Netherlands Steamship Company (NSBM). After the death of John Cockerill on June 19, 1840, in Warsaw, SA John Cockerill was formed in 1842 chaired his nephew Gustave Pastor. In April 1843, during a general board meeting, the unfavourable location of the yard on the Meuse for the construction of large vessels was noted a new site in Antwerp was discussed. On May 28 1844, Cockerill signed the lease for the grounds of the arsenal at the St. Michielskaai along the Scheldt in Antwerp, where the former shipyard founded by Napoleon Bonaparte was located. On December 23 1845 the Board of Directors decided to build a shipyard on this leased land. During 1847 the first two mail boats for Ostend-Dover route were built in Antwerp. The first transatlantic ship, Léopold I , was launched on October 17 1856. Between 1847 and 1867 more than 160 ships were built on this site. Further expansion was impossible at this site, so on December 26 1866, two plots of 5.30 hectares of pasture land located at Kattendijkdok along the planned course of the Campine Canal were purchased. The yard on the Scheldt remained in business until the end of 1872. Due to the increase of ship sizes, it soon proved the new site was not sufficient and construction work was suspended towards the end of 1877. On June 25 1873 Cockerill had acquired 6.30 hectares of pasture land located in Hoboken on the Scheldt. On 22 August work began on a new yard there, which opened on January 15 1874. A first dry dock was opened in 1883, a second in 1918 and another soon after. By purchasing the neighbouring property and equipment of Antwerp Engineering N.V., the yard was further expanded in the 1920s