New KPA dockyard to improve ship turnaround time

 

The newly commissioned Sh500 million KPA dockyard jetty that replaced the 70-year-old one, will greatly improve ship turnaround time,  the authority’s management has said.

Repair and maintenance of the marine crafts at the Mombasa port key for marine operations, has been problematic for over 10 years since the old tug jetty was decommissioned over safety reasons.

This meant ships had to wait longer than necessary for available tug and mooring boats whenever there was a breakdown in one of the marine crafts.

That will no longer be the case because the new jetty will ensure faster servicing, repair and maintenance.

The Mombasa port is classified as a compulsory pilotage port.

This means that ships coming in have to be led by the harbour tugs and the mooring boats which guide the vessels through the channel and berthing them safely.

"As port operations keep expanding, the challenge has been the repair of the marine crafts as the old jetty could not sustain the ever-growing demand. The commissioning of this new jetty therefore is timely as it will hasten the repair of marine crafts whose maximum availability is crucial to ship turnaround time, an important key performance indicator for ports,” said KPA chairman Gen (Rtd) Joseph Kibwana on Friday during the commissioning of the new jetty.

“Without a facility like the jetty here, maintenance would have been a problem and in particular when you look at the regular need for fuelling.”

KPA acting managing director Rashid Salim said the old and dilapidated jetty was often cited as an obstacle to efficient marine craft maintenance and posing as a workplace hazard or endangering the safety of users.

“Some mobile crane operators were reluctant to work on the old jetty as they feared the structure could collapse and plunge with them into the ocean. Only the daring regular marine engineering staff who used the facility day-in-day-out continued using the facility, albeit with highest sense of caution,” said Salim.

China Road and Bridges Company was contracted to do the new jetty.

They undertook the construction between January 15, last year, when works started, and February 16, 2021, when works were completed.

This implies that the authority had no designated place to berth its marine craft for the 13 months.

The coronavirus pandemic meant the company took an extra month to complete the project.

The new tug jetty is a suspended deck structure of reinforced concrete cast in-situ at approximately 12 metres from the shoreline.

It is a modern facility connected to the land side by means of an access trestle of the same construction design as the main jetty.

The jetty has an overall length of 50m, overall width of 20.64m and slab thickness of 1.2m.

The concrete deck is supported by 24 piles spaced 6m apart; each of diameter, 1m.

A total of 18 fenders and three bollards are installed alongside the new jetty.

“It will accommodate all our harbour tugs as a temporary resting place and during the refilling of provisions and maintenance.

“In this respect, I would like to note particularly that the arrangement of the new tug jetty structural members is designed to meet local load transfer and stability requirements,” Salim said.

The new jetty is expected to last at least 80 years.

The old jetty was constructed in early 1950s and the first and only rehabilitation works it underwent was in 1974. BY  THE  STAR