Hamburg?s shipping scene is bright

Herbert von Nitzsch, ceo of Blohm+Voss, said at an SMM press meeting earlier this year: “SMM is taking place this year in a completely different economic environment from two years ago. While 2000 was still a year of very high growth we are now undoubtedly faced with some very adverse economic developments and political uncertainties.” But, he added, there were “some rays of hope at the horizon”.

However, when one looks into the annual reports issued this year by maritime enterprises in the broadest sense, the year 2001 was also a booming one and the expectations for the current year are positive too. This analysis applies equally to Hamburg enterprises involved in shipping, such as the Port of Hamburg.

The port registered a 5.8% growth in cargo handling during the first three months of this year compared to the figures of 2001. In the container sector growth was even higher ? 11.8%. With these record results Hamburg is one of just a few European ports to show increasing seaport handling in the first quarter of the year. And, Hamburg is still expanding.

Cargo handling

The new container terminal on the southern arm of the Elbe river, which is under construction, will increase the port capacity by an additional two million TEU per year. This construction is the biggest building project ever realised in the history of the Port of Hamburg. The expansion, which started in March 2000, is scheduled for completion in 2004. It will leave the port with a new terminal with four berths each of 350m length and a container capacity of 30,000 TEU at the quay.

The first of these berths was taken into service after functional testing in June of this year. The official opening of the terminal took place in August. The quay ? called Ballinkai after the Hamburg shipowner Albert Ballin ? will have, after completion at the end of this year, a full length of 1,562m with a draught of 16.7m at mean sea level.

The operator of the new Container Terminal Altenwerder (CTA) is the HHLA Hamburger Hafen-und Lagerhaus-Aktiengesellschaft, the biggest single enterprise in German shipping. HHLA reported in June of this year record container handling in Hamburg of 3.1 million TEU for 2001, in which the company?s three container terminals had a market share of 65%. Officials said: “HHLA is swimming on the wave of success of the Port of Hamburg.”

One of the reasons of this success is the deepening of the Elbe river completed at the end of 1999. A further deepening of 1.0 to 1.5 metres is now under discussion.

HHLA has another container terminal under construction at Lübeck on the Baltic Sea. After completion at the end of this year this terminal will be linked to the Hamburg terminal via a “land bridge”.

Eurogate, one of HHLA?s competitors, with terminals in Hamburg and Bremerhaven reported for the first six months of 2002 a growth of 15.9% at its Hamburg container terminal, handling 806,690 TEU. With these figures, which are better than the growth in the port itself, the company is continuing its success of the previous year. In 2001 its total container handling increased by about 9%, from 1.34 million TEU in 2000 to 1.46 million TEU.

Classification society

The German classification society Germanischer Lloyd also recorded an increased turnover in 2001, by 6% to 8194 million ($190.5 million). About 78% of this turnover came from maritime activities. The world market share of GL in container vessel classification is 55.8% by the number of vessels and 48.4% by tonnage. With multi-purpose vessels it is 31.5% by the number of vessels and 35% by tonnage. The order backlog at the beginning of this year leads the management to predict that 2002 will show similar good results.

The yards

Blohm+Voss is the biggest of Hamburg?s shipyards and it celebrated its 125th anniversary this year. The main business of the yard is the development and production of naval vessels like the frigates of the German navy and the Meko programme with frigates, corvettes and fast patrol boats.

On the civil side B+V has successfully started the fast monohull programme. Up to now two vessels have been built. The management is convinced the programme will bring more passenger vessel building back to Hamburg.

B+V is also very successful in the repair business. A new docking record was realised in June with the docking of the largest vessel under German management, Peene Ore, an ore carrier of about 322,40dwt. It was the largest and broadest vessel ever docked in the “Elbe 17” dry dock. The dock has a clear width of 59.2m and the vessel a breadth of 58m, which left only 60cm on each side to accommodate Peene Ore. With the assistance of the port?s six most powerful tugs the manoeuvre was carried out successfully.

After the flood disaster of 1962 in Hamburg the shipbuilding programme of the Sietas yard, founded in Hamburg-Neuenfelde in 1635, was limited in size for about 40 years. With a ratchet, which had only a clear width of 22m, the small Este river was shut off from the Elbe. The largest container vessels built during that time had a capacity of about 1,000 TEU. A new ratchet was completed at the end of 1999 with a clear width of 40m, so the programme changed up to the new type 170 vessels with a breadth of 27.6m and about 1,700 TEU. The first new building of this type was delivered at the end of 2001.

Now Sietas has to overcome another problem: for final assembly and equipping of even larger vessels, for instance in the Panamax size, the yard needs an appropriate dry dock. In the course of the past eight years Sietas has delivered an average of 12 to 13 vessels per year, about 10 of them being container vessels.

Shipowners

After the Hamburg Express was delivered in October 2001, Hapag Lloyd received a second 7,500 TEU container vessel, Shanghai Express, in April this year. Both vessels belong to a series of four, ordered by Hapag Lloyd at Hyundai Heavy Industries in Korea. The other two vessels will follow by Spring 2003. All four vessels are powered by a low-speed two-stroke engine of type 12 K 98 MC from MAN B&W. With an output of 68,640kW the vessels reach a maximum speed of 25 knots. The Hapag Lloyd fleet comprises now 30 vessels, all but one powered by MAN B&W diesel engines. Exactly 130 years ago the shipping company started a regular service between Hamburg and Shanghai. Nowadays there are 12 weekly connections between Europe and Asia, four of them also bound for Shanghai.

Compared to Hapag Lloyd, the Hamburg-based private ferry company TT Line is a very young enterprise, with 40 years of successful operations. The fleet, consisting of seven vessels, has an average age of only four years. The latest newbuildings which joined the fleet were the Nils Holgersson (no. VI), put into service on the Travemünde -Trelleborg route in July 2001 followed by the Peter Pan (no. V) in November 2001 on the same route, which is TT Line?s traditional service.

In addition, the shipping company converted two vessels, the Nils Holgersson, which was re-named Tom Sawyer and the Peter Pan VI, now named Huckleberry Finn for the service between Rostock and Trelleborg. The investment of about 8300 million for the two newbuildings and the two conversions, including measures for necessary port equipment, was the biggest financial programme in the history of TT Line.