Container crane back in work next week

Press, 20 February 1986, Page 4

Container crane back in work next week

Lyttelton’s container crane will be working again early next week. The crane, which was knocked over and badly damaged by a ship in February last year was to have been repaired by December but Industrial problems occurred just before recommissioning.

The Lyttelton Harbour Board was told at its meeting this week that the crane had been fully completed and tested before its recommissioning.

The container terminal manager, Mr W. A. Siddall, said last evening that the crane was operational now but because the board had the use of the Samba crane, had decided to make one or two other modifications to the old crane as well as repair some of the wharf it will be using. The reintroduction of the crane has come at a time when the board is beginning to feel the effects of having it out of action for so long.

The board’s marketing what grim picture it was “not impossible” for the board to achieve its previous high volume of trade. “While the over-all growth has dropped for the South Island, so has our share. We are now competing with Port Chalmers for a decreasing market.

“It is not impossible. We hope to do it,” he said. Mr Morgan attributed much of the fall-off to the slow British-European meat exports at present. “That’s most of the falloff at present AH our other trading areas are up to budget.

“Three or four years ago the British-European meat market was 70 per cent of the over-all volume and then it dropped to about 40 to 56 per cent.

“At this point however, it is only running at 33 per cent.” he said.

The reintroduction of the container crane would in the long run save the board money, he said, manager, Mr P. G. Mor-

gan, in his report to the board, referred to figures contained within the recent publication of statistics by the Waterfront Industry Commission. These showed there had been a total increase of 20 per cent in containers handled through terminals in the South Island. “While Lyttelton had naturally suffered a substantial drop after the accident to the container crane, Port Chalmers had increased its throughput 52 per cent over that for the previous year,” said Mr Morgan’s report.

“While there had been an over-all increase in container volumes for the year, the final four months had shown a reduction in growth and it could be expected that it will become increasingly difficult for the Lyttelton terminal to regain its share of the volumes to the level experienced before the crane accident,” the report said. Mr Morgan said last evening that while the report painted a some-

“The Samba crane we are using at present is almost as good — in fact, there is not that much difference — but the Samba is costing us money to use,” said Mr Morgan. Overall, the port had suffered a decrease in gross tonnage handled of 82,824 tonnes. This amount to a 12 per cent decrease on last year, according to the chairman, Mr G. E. Wright. Mr Wright said that there was no cause for board members to be alarmed. The results of the third month of the financial year had substantially improved the standing after the first two months. “The board is still in the throes of recovery after the accident to the container crane in February 1985; and the slower-than-usual start United Kingdom-European meat trade has affected the throughput at the container terminal, although it is expected that budgeted volumes in this area of the board’s operations, will eventually be achieved,” he said.