All shipshape after carrier orders.

A TEESSIDE company has clinched pounds 27m of work on the Royal Navy's biggest ever aircraft carriers.

McGill Services of Billingham, part of Middlesbrough-based industrial services company Hertel (UK), was awarded the biggest single project in its 37-year history as part of the larger contract to build two carriers for the Royal Navy - the HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales.

The pounds 23m contract for modular cabins and wet spaces for the two carriers is supplemented by a pounds 4m order for furniture.

The work will sustain 40 jobs at McGill Services' sites on Teesside during the project, which will run from 2009 to 2012 and has been secured in partnership with the Aircraft Carrier Alliance.

Each of the carriers requires more than 400 cabins and wet space modules.

McGill Services, a preferred supplier of accommodation modules to the British Royal Navy through BVT Surface Fleet, was acquired by Hertel at the beginning of 2008.

Craig Rose, managing director of McGill, which employs more than 250 people from its Teesside head office, said: "This contract is very prestigious for McGill Services and for Hertel. Working with the Aircraft Carrier Alliance, we have been able to secure this large body of work at a time when the economy in all sectors requires a boost. Engineering and procurement has started immediately, production is due to start later in the year. It really is a positive addition to our order book, which can help us plan positively for the future."

CAPTION(S):

ALL ABOARD: Mark Witjens, Hertel Defence and Offshore's MD, left, and Craig Rose, McGill's MD, are delighted with the contract to work on the Royal Navy's new generation of aircraft carriers