Mills Navigation was instructed by an international law firm to conduct sea trials and performance reviews of a newbuild tug which had reported defective handling and less than expected performance. Acting on very short notice, our Master Mariner consultant travelled to Greece for the trials and vessel performance reviews, in an expert advisory capacity to represent our stakeholder client. With more than 20 years' experience of commanding tugs and advising manufacturers, our consultant reviewed previous performance reports and trials in coordination with the crew and with the specific issue identified, conducted 8 hours of exercises. Combining experience of real world tug handling of identical systems and machinery for manoeuvres of VLGCs, our findings were reported to the client within 24 hours of the trials taking place.