The transport of three fully-assembled Gottwald ESP 10 mobile port cranes – which are produced by crane manufacturer Konecrane – from Schiedam and Westdorpe, in the Netherlands, to ports in Chile and Mexico, has been successfully completed by cargo shipping company AAL Shipping.

The three harbour cranes – which weighed about 642 t and were 80.3 m long, including the jib, and 58.2 m tall – were transported to each of the ports in Chile and Mexico using the Super B-Class 32 000 t vessel AAL Hamburg, in an open hatch configuration.

Two of the cranes were loaded onto the vessel in Schiedam, and the third was lifted and placed in Westdorpe with AAL Hamburg’s own heavy-lift cranes. The cargo height during the lifts reached 104 m.

AAL, therefore, needed to develop a tank-top stowage and open-hatch sailing plan for the Super B-Class, which travelled across the North Atlantic and through the Panama Canal, said AAL transport engineering deputy head Yahaya Sanusi.

“As project cargoes like port cranes continue to [grow], they present unique challenges for shipping, particularly in terms of deck loading and clearance restrictions.

“The air draft may be so high that the vessel carrying these cargoes [cannot] pass under bridges. When designing the Super B-Class we addressed this issue by incorporating the open-hatch capability. This enables us to load cargoes such as the Konecranes Gottwald ESP 10 mobile harbour cranes in the hold and [sail] with the open hatch to reduce the total air draft by over 16 m.”

At their respective ports, the cranes were offloaded with AAL Hamburg’s heavy lift cranes, which can be combined to handle a maximum payload of 700 t.

Konecranes head of project management Ole Kornol said that AAL easily handled the challenge of planning and executing the sea passage of “three of Konecranes largest mobile harbour cranes”.

“AAL [offered] an excellent shipping solution where the cranes [were] stowed on the tank top deck reducing the overall air draft of the shipment to the absolute minimum. This engineering solution enabled the preferred sea passage through the Panama Canal, shortening the transit time and minimising the risk. The cooperation with AAL was very constructive and professional,” he concluded.