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Issue 6 2011


///FREIGHT BREAK Unexpected visitor N


o, Belfast hasn’t been hit by a tsunami. This is just an artist’s


impression of how one of the new ferries soon to be introduced soon on Stena Line’s new Cairnryan/Belfast would look if it moored in front of the City Hall. (Though no doubt local councillors with a need to visit Scotland in a hurry would find it very handy.) Identical ships Stena Superfast VII and Superfast VIII were scheduled to start operating on the Irish Sea on 21 November and will be the biggest ferries ever to have sailed between Scotland and Northern Ireland. Each ship can take 110 freight units, plus passengers and cars.


Pipe dream A


rail tunnel linking Russia to the US could be built for as little


as $10-12bn and could be opened as early as 2026, reports the BBC. Moreover, Russian officials have backed the idea of a 65-mile tunnel under the Bering Strait - only twice the length of our own Channel Tunnel. There is though, as ever, a snag.


Both ends of the tunnel would be in extremely remote areas and a further 2,485 miles of new rail track would be needed to link the


Feeling blue W


e’ve always thought that supporting Crystal Palace


can do strange things to you, such as believing that you’re the ‘Team of the Eighties’. Perhaps some of their fans still do, or maybe it’s now the 2080s. Here we have the living proof – it literally does make you blue. Actually, staff at GAC UK’s London


Heathrow office helped Crystal Palace FC Foundation’s efforts to support Blue September by wearing blue face paint to work one Friday. A campaign organised by the Men’s


Health Forum, Blue September is the first national drive to raise awareness of all the cancers that can affect men


Cheer up lads - only another 69 years to go...


Christmas cheer for Grangemouth


C


hristmas never looks anything as good as this chez nous, but


with mere weeks to go before the 25th December, the port of Grangemouth has begun the distribution of lights, decorations and artificial


trees for


Homebase stores around Scotland. Just one of a number of seasonal


goods that it handles for the retailer - which also includes gardening equipment and BBQs ahead of the spring/summer season - Forth Ports- owned Grangemouth has handled


a number of containers loaded with trees and decorations for the festive season.


access to the road and rail networks serving Scotland and the North of England to deliver goods to store in time for key events and activities. Homebase’s head of distribution,


Homebase takes advantage of Grangemouth’s key location and easy


Nigel Basey, said: “We are delighted with the relationship with Grangemouth and the services they provide for us at this busy time of year for retailers. By using this key port, we have ensured a greener supply chain and fast and efficient, just-in-time delivery to our stores across the country.”


and the lifestyle choices that can be made to reduce risk. More details are at: blueseptember.org.uk


E


tunnel to the rest of the Russian rail network, along with another 1,245 miles to connect the US end – which would actually be in Alaska, the detached portion of the country that lies beyond Canada - to the North American rail system. The cost of the Russian track alone has been put at around $80-90bn, and as we all know the costs of major construction projects have a habit of spiralling out of control, so it’s unlikely that the builders would get much change out of


$150bn or even $200bn. Next to these problems, dealing


with the difference in track gauge between the US (4’ 8 ½) and Russian (5’) seems like a minor issue. And if, as the promoters envisage, the tunnel were to become a conduit for China-Russia trade, there would a further gauge change between the Chinese and Russian systems. Somehow, I doubt that the


Transpacific shipping lines are losing much sleep yet.


In for the short haul


mirates will shortly be offering ‘flights’ from one side of the river


Thames to another. The Dubai-based airline has just been announced as sponsor of the new cable car river crossing between Greenwich Peninsula and Royal Docks stations and scheduled to go into operation next summer. In a £36m, ten-year deal, the cable cars will carry Emirates Air


Line branding, as will the two stations, all part of Mayor Boris Johnson’s vision “to transform east London into a bustling metropolitan quarter”. With a capacity to carry up to 2,500 people per hour in each direction in the peak, it will offer the equivalent capacity to 30 buses per hour. No word on whether the new operation will carry freight though.


But London Assembly member,


John Biggs, has sounded a sour note arguing that the £3.6m a year that the Dubai airline will be paying is “far from impressive” when compared with the £52 million Emirates give to AC Milan Football Club over four years and the £100 million they pay to sponsor Arsenal’s stadium over fifteen years, he says.


Brains wins forwarding prize A


paper on an air freight import consignment


of rabies-


infected racoon brain tissue from the US to Ireland won Silvia Valles Barrera of Dublin-based Hawthorn Logistics the Young International Freight Forwarder of


the Year


Award, presented recently at the Annual FIATA Conference in Cairo. Ms Valles Barrera, already named European Regional Finalist, works for Hawthorn as an air and sea operations executive. Her paper also covered the air freight export of a computed tomography scanner from Ireland to a hospital in Moshi, Tanzania. She wins a week based at one


of the TT Club’s regional centres in London, Hong Kong or New Jersey and attendance at the TT Club’s


Silvia Valles Barrera is the brains behind Hawthorne logistics


Insight into Transport Law and Insurance course in London. The other regional finalists Mr Niranjan Venkatesh


were


of the United Arab Emirates, representing Africa and the


Middle East Region; Ms Rosa Maria Gallardo Reyes of Mexico, representing the Americas Region; and Mr Lai Kin Wong of Hong Kong, representing the Asia Pacific Region.


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