New berths start work at Felixstowe

On 27 January the small container vessel OPDR Tenerife became the first vessel to unload boxes at the new quay in a trial operation. The 700 TEU vessel is one of three sister ships that operate a weekly service between the UK, north west continent, the Canary Islands, Madeira and southern Spain.

As MJ went to press, the new terminal was still awaiting the first trial berthings by an ultra large container vessel, but industry sources expected the newly built 366m LOA, 14,000 TEU CSCL Star to berth at the quay in mid-February during its maiden voyage from China. It has boxes stacked eight high on deck and was expected to discharge the top tier at the new quay, before re-positioning to the Trinity berths to complete cargo operations.

In other developments, the Minister of State for Transport, Rt Hon Theresa Villiers MP, has formally inaugurated the latest new crane to be installed at the Port’s South Rail Terminal, built to serve the new quay. And at the end of February the main contractor Costain is closing its dedicated website, indicating that the construction work in this phase is finished.

Paul Davey of Hutchison Ports, owners of the Port of Felixstowe, said they would continue conducting trials of equipment and systems with increasing intensity up to, and after, the formal opening in mid-2011.

Now finished is a 730m quay wall, completed terminal paving and five of the recently delivered ship to shore gantry cranes, which can handle containers stacked up to 24 wide on the world’s largest container vessels. Another two of the cranes are expected shortly from ZPMC in Shanghai.

Most of the terminal paving has now been completed, including the laying of 19m concrete blocks that will make up the storage yard area The storage yard will eventually accommodate 20,000 TEU and the first of the reefer gantries that will supply power to refrigerated containers stored on the quay are in place. These will provide a total of 336 plug in points (six gantries with 56 plug in points per gantry) taking the total at the Port to 2,474,

Remaining activities continuing during the final stage of the project include construction of buildings for the UK Border Agency, entry and exit gates and a large concrete slab for the rubber tyred gantry cranes, 12 of which have now been delivered. These RTGs are designed to stack containers five high in the container yard and are fitted with variable-speed engines and the possibility of additional energy storage systems to minimise operating costs and CO2 emissions

Dredging has deepened the water alongside the quay to 16m depth, although this could be increased to 18m when required.

by Graeme Ewens