P
ortia’s Senior Engineer has been working closely with Peel Ports as the second batch of six cantilever rail-mounted gantry (CRMG) cranes arrived in the River Mersey on Thursday 6 October ready for installing and commissioning at the £400 million Liverpool2 deep-water container terminal.
Their arrival marks end of 13,730 mile (11,930nm) journey from Nantong, China following their construction by leading Chinese manufacturer ZPMC, which also supplied the five ship-to-shore cranes and other CRMGs already on site, these six complete the set of 12 required for Phase 1 of the terminal. Ultimately the site will have eight STS and 22 CRMG cranes as part of a £100m equipment investment.
The cranes will be capable of performing an average of 20 moves per hour, with semi-automated control linked to the port’s new Navis N4 terminal operating system. They have a 40 tonne under-spreader capacity and a maximum container lift height above quay level of 21m under spreader (6+1 containers).
The cranes originally set off from Nantong in August on board the mv Zhenhua 8, passing south-east Asia, India, the Arabian Peninsula and through the Suez Canal en route to Liverpool in a 49 day journey of over 20,000km (13,730 m, 11,930nm).
Mark Whitworth, Chief Executive of Peel Ports, said: “These cranes are the final major piece of the infrastructure jigsaw as we approach the formal opening next month. Liverpool2, supported by our wider logistics offering and the port’s strategic location, will provide many shippers with a route to UK and Irish markets that helps them to cut costs, congestion and carbon emissions.”
Portia’s Engineer will continue to work alongside Peel Ports and ZPMC / ABB Engineers during the offloading, installation and commissioning.
