OOCL makes biggest US port crane buy ever - US$347 million - for LB terminal

HONG Kong's Orient Overseas International Limited (OOCL), will spend US$346.6 million cranes and yard gear for its new Long Beach terminal in the largest contract for the purchase of container handling equipment for development of a US port.

The carrier announced in a filing that it had signed contracts with equipment manufacturer Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industry for 14 ship-to-shore cranes at $11.9 million each and 70 automated stacking cranes at $2.56 million each over two contracts made on 15 June and 2 August. 2. The cranes will be delivered between 2015 and 2019 to the new Middle Harbour port development at Long Beach.

OOCL had signed a 40-year lease of the Middle Harbour port project worth $4.6 billion with the Long Beach Harbour Commission in April this year. Over the next nine years, Long Beach's aging Pier F and Pier E container terminals will be redeveloped in several phases into a new facility. The first phase of the project is due to be completed in 2016, according to Alphaliner.

Pier E was formerly occupied by HMM's California United Terminals and has already been vacated. Pier F will remain operational throughout the conversion process until the newly completed berths will gradually replace it. Pier F is currently only used by a single mainline container service - the Grand Alliance's OOCL- operated SSX, a weekly South China and Taiwan service maintained with six 8,063-TEU sister vessels.