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SOLUTION PROVIDERS Photo credit: Curtis Noble


Photo credit: Curtis Noble


Photo credit: Curtis Noble


Photo credit: Trey Spooner


RUSLAN INTERNATIONAL TRANSPORTS STRIPPING TOWER TO KURDISH OIL FIELD IN ‘FIRST OF ITS KIND’ OPERATION


Ruslan International demonstrated its unfailing capability in heavy and outsize air cargo with the airlift of a 70 tonne piece of oil and gas equipment to Iraq, which was negotiated and overseen by its U.S. representative in Houston, Volga-Dnepr Unique Air Cargo (VDUAC).


Ruslan International, in conjunction with Volga-Dnepr’s Engineering & Logistics Centre, transported the oil refinery stripping tower from Bakersfield, California to Erbil, Iraq.


It was an operation many believed to be simply impossible due to the sheer length of the cargo and the fact that it needed to be transported in one single piece. The lift, performed by one of Ruslan International’s 17-strong fleet of An-124-100 aircraft,


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was the culmination of more than a month of meticulous planning, drawing on more than 25 years of expertise in logistics, engineering and design. Manufactured in the United States, the tower was being transported by the Taq Taq Operating Company Ltd (TTOPCO) for use in the Taq Taq oil field in the Kurdistan region of Iraq.


The timing of the delivery was critical to enable operations at the refinery to begin as soon as possible. It was estimated that


the tower could refine 40,000 barrels of oil per day, so every day that it remained in the United States resulted in a significant loss of revenue for the client. Perhaps the biggest challenge associated with the lift was the fact that the piece of cargo, measuring 38.4m x 3.7m x 3.7m, was technically longer than the cargo floor of the An-124-100 by almost two metres.


Adding to the complexity, the ultimate goal was to transport the tower as it was


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