The special transport vessel will spend two months at sea transporting the biggest container cranes ever received for a container terminal in Panama and the Caribbean. The environmental-friendly cranes are capable of handling the biggest vessels in the world (with 25 container rows on deck) and are ready for operation from a remote control station. The cranes’ construction project was managed and inspected at ZPMC ship in China by Panamanian engineers.
Upon commissioning, expected by October 2015, a total of 11 post-Panamax and 8 super post-Panamax container cranes will be lined up along MIT’s 2,000m container quay.
The cranes are part of MIT’s $270M new expansion plan, that includes the deployment in June 2015 of the first Automatic Stacking Cranes in Latin America and that, when completed, will increase MIT’s yearly handling capacity to 4M TEUs. By October 2015, MIT will be able to serve 2 new-Panamax vessels simultaneously.
“These new cranes represent our commitment to Panama where we will, once this latest expansion project is completed, have invested close to $1B, and our commitment to our customers, who are eagerly waiting for the completion of the Panama Canal expansion to deploy new-Panamax tonnage in the region”, said Stacy Hatfield, MIT’s General Manager.
SSA Marine, a subsidiary of Carrix, Inc., is the largest U.S.-owned, privately-held container terminal operator and cargo handling company, handling approximately 22 million container TEUs per year at its marine and rail terminal operations. The 65 year-old company serves more than 200 locations worldwide, including port operations throughout the U.S. as well as internationally in Panama, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, South Africa, New Zealand, Vietnam and Canada.