More crane orders for HHMC

HHMC has landed an order for STS cranes and RTGs from QTerminals in Qatar.

HHMC cranes supplied earlier to the Tripoli Port Authority in Lebanon.

China’s Qingdao Haixi Heavy-Duty Machinery Co., Ltd. (HHMC) has announced that it has signed a contract with QTerminals (a joint venture established by Mwani Qatar and Milaha) for three STS cranes and 12 RTGs.

The STS cranes are very large, with an outreach of 68m and a lifting capacity of 80t. The RTGs are 40t machines. The order, said the company, marks “another great achievement of HHMC in actively integrating into the Belt and Road Initiative and vigorously promoting international operation. It is a significant milestone for the market exploitation and development of HHMC in the Middle East”.

The contract was awarded after a three-month international tender process, which included “site visits, technical exchanges and product visits”. These included Rizhao Port in China, where HHMC has delivered and installed automated cantilever RMGs. “After comprehensive evaluation of the technical, manufacturing and service capabilities and economic benefits of various manufacturers, HHMC was finally selected as the equipment supplier,” the company said.

For QTerminals, the new cranes are an important step in its vision to see Hamad become the largest greenfield port in the world, as part of Qatar’s “2030 National Vision”. US$7.4 billion has been invested in Hamad Port, which was built in 2010 and started operation in 2017.

Source: WorldCargo News

Contship Italia closes CICT Cagliari

The decision to close follows Hapag-Lloyd’s decision last year to switch various services to TangerMed. CICT has been unable to replace this loss with new business

CICT (pictured left) has an installed capacity of around 2M TEU, but handled just 219,000 TEU last year and in the first five months of this year the count was down to 44,000 TEU.

In June, the shareholders, Contship Italia (92%) and Consorzio Cacip (8%) ratified the decision already taken by Contship Italia’s Executive Board to shut down operations, making 200 workers redundant.

The search for a new transhipment customer continued until March this year, when CMA CGM stated that Cagliari has good credentials, like Malta (its existing hub), but "at the moment we are not interested and maybe not for at least the next two years," which was a polite way of saying "no."

Contship Italia has also been trying to find alternative uses for the facility, but nothing resulted from this effort to encourage pursuing any particular type of cargo.

To buy itself some time to salvage the situation, the port authority (AdSP Cagliari), with the support of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport in Rome, has postponed sine die the legal forfeiture of the CICT concession, meaning that someone else could take it over without having to go through a tender process.

MSC has committed to invest €120M-€140M in Medcenter in the next few years

CICT Cagliari was Contship Italia’s last surviving transhipment operation in Italy. Earlier this year it conceded its 50% share of the troubled MCT Gioia Tauro terminal to its co-shareholder TIL, so the operation is now 100% controlled by MSC Group.

As reported in the April 2019 edition of WorldCargo News, it was rumoured that, in exchange, Contship Italia took over MSC’s 20% stake in Eurogate Tanger.

Both Eurogate Tanger and Eurogate Cyprus in Limassol are managed for Eurogate Group by its affiliate Contship Italia, so the group remains very active in the Mediterranean transhipment market.

OMG-Bedeschi STS cranes arriving in Limassol, Cyprus from Italy earlier this year

The Cyprus terminal recently took delivery of two OMG-Bedeschi STS cranes. These were built in Italy and assembled in and shipped from the Port of Chioggia, near Venice, on an Augustea tug and barge chartered by OMG.

Meanwhile, eight new Kalmar straddle carriers have just arrived at MCT Gioia Tauro, as part of an order for 40 machines (not 32 as previously reported) worth more than €40M. The others will be delivered over the course of the summer.

At the moment TIL is dismantling three older STS cranes deemed no longer fit for purpose. The facility will shortly receive three Chinese-built STS cranes with a 23-wide outreach, with another three due to be delivered in December.

MSC’s relaunch plan, with which it had to satisfy the Italian government in order for the MCT concession to be kept alive, requires €120M-€140M of new investments, with a view to increasing annual throughput to 4M TEU within two years. The terminal handled 2.3M TEU last year.

Addendum 19th July – A fire broke out this morning on one of the cranes being dismantled at MCT Gioia Tauro. At the time of writing, firefighters are still at the scene. Nobody has been hurt, but damage to the structure cannot be assessed at this juncture.

Source: WorldCargo News

New Equipment for Ashdod

An new STS crane, reachstackers and forklifts have arrived at Ashdod, Israel.

The Ashdod Port Company claims it now has the largest STS crane in Israel with the arrival of a new ZPMC unit with an outreach of 66m, sufficient for a 23-row vessel. The crane, which arrived last month, cost around €9.5M. The port operator said it has an option for further 9 cranes.

Features of the 65t ZPMC STS crane, which arrived on the Zhenhua 23, include optional “semi-automatic” operation, an OCR system to capture container numbers, and a chassis positioning system.

Orna Hozman Bechor, chairwoman of the Board of Directors of the Ashdod Port Company, said that “The introduction of the largest STS crane in Israeli ports puts Ashdod Port at the forefront of operations and technology, and will enable the company to continue providing the most advanced solution currently available in the field of marine cargo in Israel, with considerable improvement to the Port’s output.”

Some of the new reachstackers feature support jacks (Pictures by Pavel Tolchinski)

In the yard Ashdod Port Company has taken delivery of eight new FLTs and seven reachstackers from Kalmar. The eight 16t FLTs will replace an existing fleet of 12t machines and are equipped with fire suppression systems.

About half of the existing reachstacker fleet is also being replaced with new 45t Kalmar machines, some of which are fitted with jacks (as pictured). The reachstackers will also have a container weighing system, which will be connected to the port’s TOS,

The port reports each reachstacker cost €450,000 and each 16t FLT €200,000

Source: WorldCargo News