Tuscor Lloyds was called in to organise the multimodal transportation of this break bulk and out of gauge shipment from Tipton (near Birmingham, UK) to Altamira. The cargo was collected from the packers in Tipton and loaded onto a low loader trailer/ truck for the 180 mile road transportation east to the port of Felixstowe from which the cargo would sail to Mexico.
The cargo was to be loaded on to the a maafi trailer using the port’s wire lift, and marine surveyors commissioned by Tuscor Lloyds were set to meet the truck carrying the slitter case in order to inspect the cargo before discharging from the Truck. Due to issues with the truck driver the cargo was running late meaning that whilst the truck should have been undergoing inspections the marine surveyors had to re-plan their time and instead decided to inspect other pieces of the shipment which had already been loaded and secured to 3 high-cube and 1 flatrack container.
The truck carrying the main cargo piece eventually arrived and was delivered straight to the port wire lift area and checked for damage, of which there was none. The cargo was lifted from the truck on to a maafi trailer using four 12 ton heavy wires which were secured to the reinforced lifting points on the base of the cargo casing. The cargo was temporarily secured to the maafi trailer with a couple of heavy duty ratchet straps which would keep the cargo safe during movement around the quay.
Tuscor Lloyds arranged with the vessel for the cargo to be loaded as a break bulk shipment using one 40ft flatrack container. Due to changes in the loading time of the cargo and a new position for the flatrack container (high on-top a stack of containers without safe access for lashing) the loading plan had to be revised. The new plan was to pre-load the slitter case to the flatrack before loading to the vessel, making lashings much safer for the stevedores.
The slitter case, secured to the 40ft flatrack container was checked and lifted using a port crane with hydraulic spreader. The flatrack was secured to the container stack using auto-twistlocks in each corner.
The remaining 3 high cube containers and 1 other flatrack container was also loaded to the vessel without damage. The cargo arrived as scheduled at the port of Altamira was discharged and delivered to our customer.
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