The Aviles-based quay in Valliniello makes an impressive entry into the history books of the Port of Aviles, with the shipment of the longest ever piece to be loaded onto a ship in the estuary.The flexicoquer equipment’s first destination will be Cristobal Port in Panama, from where it will be moved to its final destination, the Talara refinery owned by the Petroperu company in Peru.
The Idesa company, from the Daniel Alonso Group, was commissioned to manufacture this engineering work. Specifically, five pieces were commissioned and produced by the workshop, and will be transported on the same vessel to Panama. The dimensions of the largest piece – 73.6 metres long, 9.40 metres high and 8.15 metres wide – far exceed any piece commissioned to date, and smash current records at the Port of Aviles. Its weight at 586 tonnes – heavier than three blue whales – has put the skills, capacity and coordination of the thirty-strong professional team of the consignee and stevedore company Marítima del Principado to the test, responsible for hoisting, positioning and fastening it to the vessel. Hoisting equipment of this magnitude must be performed in a single manoeuvre, making this task more arduous and lengthy.
The ship responsible for transporting the five enormous pieces, which collectively weigh 2273 tonnes, is the “Happy Buccaneer”, a 146-metre long freighter brandishing a Dutch flag. The ship arrived at the Valliniello quay on Saturday, 21st January, four days before commencing the hoisting operation, so as to prepare and set up the loading areas ready for the five pieces that have been waiting at the quay since summer. After five days of loading operations, the ship set sail for Panama.
Only six flexicoquer equipments are working nowadays and the one going to Talara’s refinery will be the seventh. The asturian company Idesa is the proud manufacturer of last two.
