North Sea Terminal Bremerhaven (NTB) prepared for the future with the four new Liebherr ship to shore (STS) container cranes

NTB in Bremerhaven has taken delivery of four additional Liebherr ship to shore container cranes. It brings to ten the number of Liebherr STS at the port since the first STS was handed over in 2018.

The cranes are identical to the previous supplied and are amongst the largest STS cranes in the world with an outreach of 73 m, a span of 30.48 m and a backreach of 25 m. The cranes have a safe working load of 75 tonnes and are able to handle the world’s largest container vessels. Designed to work vessels with 25 containers across and up to 10 high on deck, the cranes will allow NTB to handle future generations of ultra large container vessels.

As well as being amongst the largest, the cranes are also some of the most advanced. Liebherr Automation Systems facilitates semi-automatic moves, with manual intervention only required when operating below a predefined safe height. The port operates straddle carriers on the landside and the cranes are equipped with a yard monitoring system, which scans the operational area for obstacles, hazards or straddle carriers, and will allow placement of the container at the target position only when it is safe to do so.

Innovative straddle carrier lane covers open only over the active lane, providing protection for those on the ground. Stack and vessel anti-collision, in addition to a vessel drift compensation system, provides safety when operating. Crane to crane, and crane to ship, laser anti-collision systems provide further safety when the crane is travelling or booming down.

Speaking about the cranes Christian Lankenau, Managing Director NTB commented, “We are pleased to add four new Liebherr ship to shore container cranes to our fleet. These new cranes and the previous six allow us to provide exceptional service to our customers. We have invested in these large state-of-the-art cranes, not only for the present, but also for the future and they are a key part of our growth and expansion plans.

For NTB it was very straightforward to invest in Liebherr cranes again. Our experience with Liebherr equipment in terms of performance, reliability and service has been very satisfying.”

David Griffin, Managing Director at Liebherr Container Cranes added. “It has been very exciting to work with NTB. Designing high performance machines to customers exacting specifications is always rewarding, but to secure repeat orders on the strength of the machines performance is doubly so.”

NTB is one of the most important European container terminals with an annual handling volume of more than 3 million TEU.