Three giant cranes arrive at Port of Antwerp

The Port of Antwerp welcomed three huge ship-to-shore cranes on Saturday. The cranes can handle ships up to 26 containers wide and are part of a 200 million euro expansion plan by logistics operator DP World.

The giant cranes have been travelling by sea from Shanghai for the past three months. On Saturday, they were carefully piloted into Antwerp, but there is still a lot of work to do.

“Rolling off a crane from the ship to the quay rails is done via a special walkway and takes about four to six hours,” says Jef Lambregts of DP World. “Unloading these monsters is a delicate job. All the conditions such as weather, visibility, wind and water level have to be perfect. The whole operation will take about a week.”

The cranes are expected to be in operation by the summer and DP World says they should enable the site at the Deurganck dock to significantly increase its volume. The company “strongly believes in Antwerp’s position as a world port and gateway to Europe”, says Dirk Van den Bosch, CEO of DP World Antwerp Gateway.

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