The dredging activities are in full swing at South Asia Pakistan Terminals Limited (SAPT) in order to achieve dredging target with a depth of 16 meters by the end of next month. The contract of dredging project has been awarded to Belgian company Van Oord. The company has deployed some of the world's most hi-tech machinery to complete the dredging within due date.
According to the officials, state-of-the-art dredgers have been brought to Pakistan by Van Oord, working on both sides of the deep sea port to develop channels for ships anchorage. One of the dredgers is called Cutter Suction Dredger (CSD) while the other is the Trailing Suction Hopper Dredger (TSHD).
The formal inauguration of the deep sea terminal by the Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif is likely to be held in the mid of March this year.
The test operation has successfully started at the terminal and after inauguration, commercial operations with mother ships will commence at SAPT
During test operations, the terminal has so far handled 35,000 TEUs and a total number of 19 vessels from different international shipping lines.
SAPT will become the biggest terminal in Pakistan, being developed with a total investment of $1.4 billion. Its capacity of handling cargo is nearly 3.1 million TEUs which is more than the capacity of three operating terminals in Pakistan.
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