Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG (HHLA) has announced that two container gantry cranes were loaded this week at HHLA Container Terminal Burchardkai in Hamburg to be transported on 28-29 June to the Estonian capital of Tallinn, where they will start operations at the HHLA TK Estonia terminal.
Both container gantry cranes were in operation at Burchardkai for 16 years and when they commenced operating in 2005, they were among the largest container handling cranes at the Port of Hamburg.
However, the increase in ship sizes in recent years made larger gantry cranes a necessity and therefore, HHLA put into service a total of five new container gantry cranes for handling ultra large container vessels with a cargo volume of 23,000+TEU at Burchardkai back in 2019 and 2020.
These cranes replaced five smaller units, three of which were dismantled in 2020. The two remaining cranes from Kocks, which can handle 14,000TEU container vessels, will be used at HHLA TK Estonia to handle Baltic Sea traffic.
“In future, we will no longer have three but five container gantry cranes to handle ships. It is another important milestone in the further development of our terminal into a key Baltic hub within the port network of HHLA,” commented Riia Sillave, Managing Director of HHLA TK Estonia.
The journey of the cranes will lead around the Skagen Odde peninsula, past Copenhagen and Malmö, and then on to Estonia. It is expected to arrive at the terminal in Muuga, near Tallinn, on 9 July.
The cranes will be customized after arrival and are expected to commence operations by the end of the year. Even before the transhipment, container gantry crane operators and technicians of HHLA TK Estonia were trained by their Hamburg-based colleagues so that they will be ready to begin operations once the cranes are set up.
In 2018, HHLA acquired the Estonian multi-function terminal near Tallinn and integrated it into its port network.
