It needs to be noted that reaching the 10 million container mark was accelerated in the last year and a half, after Haifa Port broke the all time record in 2012 for container transport in an Israeli port – 1,377,000 TEU. From the beginning of this year, 551,000 TEU were handled, which brought the port to exactly 10 million containers today. Around 2.5 millions of the total of 10 million was already managed by Haifa Port’s new Terminal Operating System, Navis SPARCS N4.
The ceremony took place at the edge of the Carmel terminal next to Zim Texas that calls Haifa Port with its ZCA line from the U.S east coast ports. The guests included senior Zim officials, among them Rani Ben-Yehuda, manager of the Israel and the Near East area office, Oren Milstein, acting Chairman of Haifa Port, members of the board, the port’s CEO Mendi Zaltzman, the port’s managers and hundreds of the port’s workers.
Just before 2 P.M. all of the employees put on special shirts that were prepared for the event, and on them was written “proud to be part of the success”, along with the number of 10,000,000 TEU. The ceremony was surrounded by containers of the shipping companies that work with the port, for example, Lucy Borchard , MSC, Maersk and of course Zim.
When the sign was given, and without any warning, one of Zim’s containers – that was decorated ahead of time with a sign for the event, was lifted towards the crowd and transported towards the water line before being loaded for export on Zim Texas, prior to making its way to the United States on Zim’s ZCA route.
When the container had passed the hundreds of employees, balloons were released in an impressive and beautiful display.
The container’s loading onto the ship, accompanied by a prolonged siren of the Zim Texas, was performed by the STS Crane operator of many years, Ya’akov Levi. The ceremony concluded with a call by the event’s MC, – “To the next 10 million containers”.