Colombo Port's first deep water terminal commissioned

By Gamini Warushamana

The first deep water container terminal in the Port of Colombo, owned and operated by Colombo International Container Terminals Ltd (CICT) launched operations last week.

General Manager of CICT, Tissa Wickramasinghe said that this is a significant milestone in the history of the Port of Colombo, where a green field project has been constructed, equipped and made operational ahead of original time-lines.

Construction work commenced in December 2011 with a project completion timeframe of 60 months. However, the terminal operator revised the plan and fast tracked the project to complete it within 28 months. Within 19 months, the first phase of construction was completed and equipped with the largest ever ship-to-shore gantry cranes and commercial operations were launched last Monday, Wickramasinghe said.With this new terminal, the Port of Colombo becomes the only port in the South Asia region with a deep-water terminal to handle the largest ships afloat. The container terminal has a water depth of 18 metres and has installed ship-to-shore quay gantry cranes to handle 18,000 TEU ships which have containers stacked 24 across.

“We acknowledge the support and cooperation extended by the Sri Lanka Ports Authority in achieving this near impossible task.

This support was extended not purely as a shareholder of CICT but also to make Colombo the regional maritime hub as declared in the Mahinda Chinthana,” he said.Shipping industry sources said that this specific development project in the Port of Colombo will enable the largest of ships to call at the Port of Colombo and hence shippers too could benefit from the economies of scale, that these large behemoths would provide.

They said that this development will be the cornerstone to develop shipping activity between China and the emerging market of India, through the regional hub of Colombo.