Saldanha finally catches up with iron ore backlog

ALAN PEAT
THE HUGE backlog of export iron ore at the port of Saldanha is likely to have been cleared by the time this article goes to print. The breakdown of one of the pair of ore loaders on September 26 while the other was shut-down for maintenance resulted in a build-up of around
1.6-million export tons worth R1.2-billion. But the maintenance programme on one of the machines was successfully completed on October 19, and loading operations got underway once again. Official Transnet statements have not yet revealed the cause of the breakdown to the other unit, but a structural failure is suspected, FTW was told – with the support structure for the tippler car having totally collapsed. After extensive investigation by manufacturers, Thyssen Krupp, a replacement structure is currently being manufactured in Germany – but the second ore loader is not expected to come back on stream for about six months. However, according to Transnet, these repairs to the broken-down loader will not adversely affect operations in the mid-term – as only one unit is customarily in operation at any given time. The parastatal did however concede that having one loader out of operation will in the short-term “impact” on the flexibility of ship loader maintenance and general operating schedules.