Overhead cranes for the DCT Terminal

24.08.2006

Overhead container cranes and overhead mobile cranes for piling containers in storage yards will be shipped from Ireland to the Port of Gdansk, destined for the largest deepwater container terminal in Poland. The Investor DCT Gdansk SA has placed an order with the Ireland-based company Liebherr Container Cranes in Killarney to build three large-sized overhead container cranes and five overhead mobile cranes. The delivery is scheduled for February 2007.

The cranes will be delivered in parts and assembled in Poland. Crane operators training is planned to start in March next year. The DCT Terminal is well suited to the handling of the largest container carriers sailing the Baltic Sea - the type of post-panamax ship - carrying over 6 thou. TEU (20-feet containers) piled in 10 rows. The parameters of shore cranes have been specifically selected in order to handle vessels of such large sizes.

The Port of Gdansk boasts advantages that present the opportunity for it to become a typical distribution hub. Up to 16.5-metre draught at the Northern Port quays combined with tide-free and ice-free waters provide superb conditions for ocean-going container ships to start calling at the container terminal, with discharged containers to be shipped to other ports by smaller vessels, so-called feeders. Even though it is necessary to assume that in the initial stage of its operation, the Terminal will provide services mainly to regional carriers running smaller container ships, the growth in orders placed by the world's major shipowners to build post-panamax type container ships allows to expect that, with time, such vessels will start calling at the Port of Gdansk.

It is expected that upon the launch of the Terminal, resulted from the completion of phase I of the investment implementation in June 2007 and with the use of the above-mentioned shore cranes and overhead mobile cranes, the annual throughput capacity of the DCT Terminal will ammount 250 thou. TEU. Besides, at the Ro/Ro quay suited for the loading and unloading of goods on vehicles and of new cars, each year, additional 160 thou. TEU will be handled. According to the Investor's outlook - more overhead cranes will be purchased in the next phase of the investment implementation, aimed to bolster the annual throughput capacity in terms of container handling up to 0.5 million TEU, to eventually reach the targeted 1 million TEU.