The new deep water port of Port Elizabeth, Nggura, open to the public
In October 2009, South Africa opened a new deep water port at Port Elizabeth. The port, called Nggura, at the mouth of the Coega River in Algoa Bay, is one of the few deep-water ports in Africa that is capable of handling large modern container ships, rather than the medium-sized ships that are handled in most other South African countries. and African ports.
Nggura was put to the test with its first commercial container ship, the MSC Catania, a ship 300 meters long and 13 meters deep. Two teams of port operators unloaded and handled the ship’s containers in a successful trial operation using state-of-the-art Liebherr ship-to-shore cranes. With an average time of 19 containers per hour, the port captain, port authorities and port agents will be more than satisfied with the first results.
According to a Transnet statement cited by business.iafrica.com, the deepwater port will be able to host ‘Ultra-Mega’ ships that are capable of carrying 6,000 to 10,000 TEUs (20ft equivalent units), and will be able to handle more than 100 container movements per hour of ship work. There is also scope to increase the capacity to 2 million TEUs. In addition, the port has good connections with the transport of goods by road and rail.
The deepwater port of Nggura is part of the Coega Industrial Development Zone, an initiative to boost the economy in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. But its economic benefits will have a significant impact on South Africa, especially as the Senegal coast is riddled with pirates and ships that would have docked along that part of the coast are heading further south, towards South Africa. Rob Jeffrey, director and senior economist at Econometrix, believes the new deepwater port will also benefit the area in terms of skills development as jobs are created and skilled people flow in from other parts of the country.
Nggura contains a world-class container terminal with two berths (with two more on the way), a multipurpose terminal with two berths, and a liquid bulk terminal with one berth. Nggura will also host three new tugs in the near future, which are undergoing sea trials in the port of Durban. In April and May 2010, two additional tugs will be delivered to the deepwater port of Port Elizabeth, each costing R120 million with a 70-ton bollard.
In addition to its already impressive credentials, first-rate security measures have been implemented to safeguard the volume of national and international merchandise passing through the port.
