Berbera, 10 November 2009 (Somalilandpress) — The port of Berbera welcomed the largest ship in its history on Sunday, using the opportunity to promote its 12-metre deep-water facility that was constructed in 1964 by Russian engineers at a cost of $5.6 million.
[ad#Google Adsense (200×90)]
The MV Anders, a 230-metre Saint Kitts and Nevis flagged ship was carrying some 20, 000 tons of food for Somaliland investors from the Gulf states.
Berbera port vice-director, Mr Bile Hersi Eid warmly welcomed the ship and its crew to the port and added they were expecting similar sized ship-liners in the coming days.
He said port of Berbera was capable of handling such sized ships and that the port authority are expanding the Port of Berbera container terminal and proceeding with development plans to modernize its deep-water facility to meet modern demands.
The deep-water facility was completed in 1969 and was the main commercial seaport for what was then the Somali Republic.
Source: Somalilandpress
Its good news Berbera can definitely support mega containers and our friends in the Gulf, Ethiopia and other parts of Africa need to know that. They need to start using Berbera.
Berbera is now the only port that can export livestock to Saudi Arabia another boost.
Dear Mr Bile Hersi Eid (Berbera port vice-director,),
Are trying to pollute our beautiful beaches by allowing such a old junk to dock in our waters ???? and you even dare to promote that it is the largest ever built ship,,,,etc,,,,, shame on you,,, shame on you….
Dear readers pls see the article in the next few posted comments ( luck of space) , then you'll know the type of info our so called port authority are feeding us.
Allah will account those in the authority who mislead us.
Simple, if the authority claim that they didn't know the condition of the vessel,,,,,, then they are not the right people for the job.
Muddy Waters
Are U.S. shipping companies still sending their clunkers to the toxic scrap yards of South Asia?
By Jacob Baynham
Posted Friday, Sept. 18, 2009, at 7:11 AM ET
A ship-breaking yardWhen the 30-year-old cargo ship MV Anders cruised out of Norfolk, Va., at 11 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 26, it may have been sailing through one of the largest loopholes in U.S. maritime regulations.
Three weeks earlier, the Anders was a U.S.-flagged vessel called the MV Pfc. James Anderson Jr., named for a young Marine who saved his platoon members' lives by falling on a Viet Cong grenade. It had hauled cargo for the U.S. Navy for more than two decades and was now retiring. The ship's new owners, Star Maritime Corp., had renamed it the Anders, painted over the excess letters on the hull, and raised the flag of its new registry—the Caribbean nation of St. Kitts and Nevis. The Anders left Virginia empty.
SEE THE NEXT POSTED COMMENT
The Basel Action Network, a Seattle-based environmental group leading the campaign to stop the export of old ships for scrap, monitors old vessels in U.S. waters and alerts the EPA when their owners attempt to recycle them overseas. There are several reliable warning signs. First, a ship is sold to an obscure company (which U.S. ship-breakers call a "Last Voyage Inc."), which is sometimes a subsidiary of a larger company active in the scrapping business. Then it is renamed and registered under another nation's flag before sailing to South Asia.
"It's outrageous that these ships were allowed to sail," says Colby Self, director of BAN's Green Ship Recycling campaign. "In a sense, they were government vessels." But once the ships' contracts had expired, all legal responsibilities lay with their owners.
SEE THE NEXT POSTED COMMENT
Most of the world's old ships are sent to die on the shores of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Vessels are beached there at high tide and cut into pieces by teams of poorly paid migrant workers. Heavy equipment and cranes are inoperable on the sand, so workers dismantle the ships by removing large portions, which drop to the beach. They use fire torches to cut through steel hulls—even those of old oil tankers. Dozens of workers die each year from explosions, falling steel, and disease. As for the asbestos, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), tributyltin (TBT), and other toxic materials onboard the old ships, much of it washes out to sea. (PCBs and TBT are persistent organic pollutants that work their way up the marine food chain and damage the nervous systems of large mammals.)
If the Anders and Bonny are headed to Bangladesh, they won't be alone. South Asia's ship-breaking yards are experiencing an ironic boom in the middle of the global recession. Ship owners faced with shrinking cargo volumes are culling their fleets by scrapping old vessels rather than paying for them to sit empty. South Asia's yards, which take advantage of cheap labor, scant regulations, and high regional demand for steel, will buy a vessel for twice the price a U.S. ship-breaker could offer. In Bangladesh, ships like the Anders and Bonny (which are two-and-a-half football fields long and weigh more than 23,000 tons) are worth at least $7 million apiece.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>Illaahow Inoo Naxariiso>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>