The Swanson dock is located on the north banks of the Yarra River, 2 km downstream from Melbourne’s City centre and the Bolte Bridge. This was Melbourne’s first international shipping facility that was officially opened on 7 March 1969, by the Governor of Victoria, Sir Rohan Delacombe.
Swanson’s Docks is Australia’s busiest port and has a maximum berth length of 884 meters on the East side wharf and 944 meters on the west side wharf and with over 183 acres of container storage room and roadways, with the potential to expand as trade grows within Melbourne.
In September 2013 DP World added a new Liebherr STS Crane to its existing Fleet, weighing in at 945 tonnes the crane arrived at the DP terminal in many parts on board the special cargo vessel ‘Thorco Celebration’ in May after a seven- week journey from Leibherr’s Crane manufacturing facility in Ireland. When fully assembled, the crane measures over 100 metres high (with boom up) which improves its productivity at the Swanson Terminal. The Liebherr STS Crane is capable of lifting two 20 foot containers simultaneously to a waterside outreach of 50 metres with a Safe Working Load (S.W.L.) of 65 tonnes and hoist speeds of up to 180 metres a minute.
DP World worked closely with a special project group from Liebherr, and with local contractors, to assemble the crane on site at the Swanson Terminal. Ace Tower Hire had been one of the selected contractors to play a large part in progress of the access construction of the STS Crane. The project was pieced together with countless large steel components some weighting up to 32tons over a period of two months. One of Ace’s specialised unique 70m elevated work platform made accessing DP personal, rigging and technicians a breeze to its maximum working height. Ace Tower Hire worked in combination with Metcalf Crane service, 600t truck mounted mobile crane, the Demag TC2800-1 600t which had a phenomenal lifting performance that could assemble the largest crane section by section. Ace Tower Hire plant gain access to these large lifted steel pieces over 60m in the air, guiding sections and bolting them together to building the Crane. With the growth for larger access platforms, like for this major project, Ace Tower has been essential to meet the ever increasing needs of our customers throughout Melbourne.
