16 >> 15 vessels last


Issue 4 2021 - FBJNA


with 62,000 deadweight


tonnage and combined lifting capacity of up to 300 metric tons. The first of the series, the spokesperson says, will be delivered by year’s end. Several other liners are also


enlarging their fleets. With SAL and Jumbo


Shipping now boasting a joint fleet of 30, the former added several


year,


including three P1-type ships, and BBC Chartering is phasing in five 25,000-deadweight-ton secondhand vessels, with more vessels coming in the next two years, the respective liners’ executives. That alone seems to bode well


for project cargo. Summing things up, SAL’s


Hoffman sounds as if he’s in a conference call with these like- minded—and optimistic—execs:


Rhenus Logistics handles a tangle of piping with oil and gas projects returning, and while the German logistics provider sees oil and gas investments slowing. (Rhenus Logistics photo.)


“The pandemic has caused


much trouble among us all, but volume-wise, we didn’t feel too great an impact overall, and 2021 has been busier than ever. There were, at times last year, challenges related to lockdowns, where cargo owners either had delays in production plans or couldn’t get their cargo to ports.” Then he goes on to say: “As


port operations were affected from the many restrictions, through a proactive approach and lot of careful planning, it was still possible for us to execute voyages hardly without interruptions.”


A tugboat floats between SAL Heavy Liſt’s MV Trina and a Jumbo vessel, MV Fairlane, two ships whose companies created the Jumbo-SAL Alliance in mid-April. (SAL Heavy Liſt photo.)


///PROJECT CARGO INSIGHTS Project cargo


weight in a world of heavier challenges By John Jeter


Imagine a single piece of equipment so big that it can’t fit into the world’s largest cargo aircraſt. That’s what happened when an Antonov Airlines customer needed a 160-tonne apparatus loaded into the AN- 225 Mriya, a behemoth with a 25-tonne capacity. Turns out the liſting points


on the cargo’s upper corners were too high. The client suggested cutting off the points; welding them back on at the destination; then leaving the piece overnight for the welds to cool. “Suddenly, there in the


ensuing silence, one of our representatives said, ‘Can these liſting points be made on bolted connections? This will allow us to dismantle them on loading and install again easily,’” recalls Andriy Blagovisniy, Antonov’s commercial director. “The manufacturer exclaimed: ‘Yes, it can be done!’ Everyone was silent; this was clearly the answer we had been searching for.”


This, he says, as Antonov’s


volumes increased up to 2.5 times aſter the start of the pandemic. Then, with COVID-19’s


spread well underway across the globe, a Lynden Air Cargo Hercules circumnavigated it in just under two weeks last February. The main mission: deliver


urgently needed equipment to a mine in Papua New Guinea. The challenge: the cargo was too tall to fit into most aircraſt capable of landing in


the remote location. Just as challenging: navigating the myriad restrictions and other pandemic-related hurdles through nearly a dozen countries while flying around the world. “We are oſten called to fly


into locations unimaginable for most aircraſt,” the airliner’s President Rick Zerkel says. “This delivery in Papua New Guinea really underscored the unique capabilities of the Hercules.” If anything, COVID-19


created new—if unfortunate— opportunities. “Since the pandemic, we see


that the term ‘project cargo’ has gradually expanded,” says Konstantin Vekshin, COO of Volga-Dnepr Group. “It is not only about outsized and superheavy equipment from traditional oil and energy and aerospace sectors.” As for increased demand for


health-care project shipments, he notes the liner transported 30,000 tonnes of “vital cargo worldwide,” a 40% increase over 2019. As for project cargo’s future,


Ritesh Nair, Global Sales director at Rhenus Project Logistics, sounds bullish. “While there were initial


concerns on the pandemic’s effect on business, the market was more active and firmer than we initially expected,” he says. “We have seen that continue into 2021. We have strong projections in our books for the second half of 2021 and going into 2022, as well.”


airlines carry the


Antonov Airlines flies some of the largest cargo aircraſt in the world. Here’s one of their fleet in action, an AN-124-100. (Antonov Airlines photo)


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