CLOSEENCOUNTERS

ig, bigger, AGF: “AGF” is of carrying 16,000 standard containers A trend that makes Mathias Lün- Lay-by berth | The number of huge containerships calling at the a German abbreviation for (TEU), they were unmatched giants when stedt’s work even more challenging. The Handling an increasing port of keeps increasing – an enormous exceptionally large vessels, they were commissioned two years ago. 44 year-old navigational officer not only number of large challenge. The “Nautical Terminal Coordination”, i.e. ships longer than 330 Since then plenty of water has has to be intimately familiar with the va- container vessels metres and wider than 45 flowed down the Elbe river, and ships garies of a tidal harbour and the weather, requires an intelligent co-initiated by HHLA, helps the port manage big Bmetres. Ships like the “Alexander von have become even bigger. Current cham- above all, he must command the art of control system. ship traffic smoothly. Humboldt” of French owner CMA CGM pions carry around 19,000 TEU, and the ‘juggling’ ships – or rather, their dimen- and her sister vessels who are frequent first vessels capable of taking on more sions and draughts, their current posi- guests at Hamburger harbour: 396 me- than 20,000 TEU were ordered recently tions and prospective laydays for tres long, 53.6 metres wide and capable (refer to diagram on p. 10). discharging and loading. Delays 

6 HHLA I HAMBURGER HAFEN UND LOGISTIK AG INGENIOUSSOLUTIONS 7 all terminals serving large vessels will use of water, depth varies along the shipping the services of NTK one day. lane, and the North Sea’s tides also influ- Mathias Lünstedt and his col- ence water levels. leagues Martin Steffen and Lukas Heim- lich proactively observe very large ves- Growth forecast | The objective is sim- sels entering the from ple enough: get every vessel, even the the North Sea and returning from port so biggest ones, whether cruise ship, con- as to avoid problematic ship encounters tainer, coal or car carrier, up the Elbe in the shipping lane of the river Elbe. river and back down to the North Sea Their job involves complex con- as smoothly as possible, avoiding an- siderations, and deep-draught ships are choring times in the German Bight or their points of reference. “These ships unnecessary waiting times at the termi- need high tide for going upstream,” says nals. To accomplish this the NTK’s staff Foresight | Mathias Lünstedt. “So we must schedule all the must get an overall picture of the sit- Lünstedt and his team plan other ones around them.” The river Elbe uation first, then develop flexible sug- for arrivals of big ships far doesn’t always carry the same amount gestions.  in advance.

Narrows | Ship encounters on  must be kept in mind, as well, nearly 1,200 feeder vessels at Hamburg How the NTK works the Elbe river are a major as the narrow time windows available for harbour in 2014 alone. Feeders bring The Nautical Terminal concern for the NTK staff: In vessels up to 400 metres long to enter the in containers for transhipping to the Coordination team keep some places, the combined port, turn around and be tugged into the big oceangoing ships, mainly from the track of ships departing Brunsbüttel width of two ships passing right harbour basin. 400mBaltic region. They also distribute cargo from various terminals and each other must not exceed Lünstedt, himself a former ship- from the liners, mostly coming from Asia Captured by NTK calculate the available tran- 90 metres. master, is one of currently three, and as Pacific, to other ports. sit options as well as arrival Störkurve of next September, five staff members and departure times based 400m Glückstadt of the Nautical Terminal Coordination Early-warning320m system | Hamburg’s Captured by NTK on draught requirements. (NTK) team in Hamburg. Established in four container terminals were the initia- A number of other require- autumn 2014, the NTK is part of FLZ tors of the NTK. In addition, Hansaport, ments must be sorted Hamburger Feeder Logistik Zentrale, or theStadersand port’s biggest coal and ore tran- out with the NTK, as well: 320m Space for giants | The shipping feeder logistics centre, a joint venture of shipment centre, and Unikai, Hamburg’s At what time can a ship lane between the state border the two container handling and logistics leading car terminal serving Landesgrenzeroll-on/roll- pass under the Köhlbrand and the estuary will be widened to companies HHLA and Eurogate. off and combined car and container ves- bridge? Which ships may Blankenese 385 metres, allowing very large It has been operating very suc- sels, have joined the club. HHLA holds pass each other at what Lühekurve 270m ships to pass one another. cessfully since 2004 and coordinated shares in all of these385m companies. Ideally, locations? How will chang- ing water levels affect ship traffic? When will the ship Hamburg Hamburg Marina currently at berth be ready 250m NTK to leave? During which shift Felixstowe Hamburg Captured by NTK Bremerhaven is a terminal planning to 385 m (250 m + 135 m) State Border Southampton Rotterdam begin discharging a ves- Blankenese Antwerp sel? The NTK team must

Schleswig-HolsteinHamburg Zeebrugge also consider the effects 270 m (250 m + 20 m) Le Havre Hanskalbsand 250 m of every decision on the Schleswig-Holstein operational status of other Lower Saxony ships, and update their calculations accordingly. Elbe Neßsand

Lower Saxony Hamburg

Captured by NTK

Begegnungsstrecke8 HHLA I HAMBURGER HAFEN UND LOGISTIK AG INGENIOUSSOLUTIONS 9  Their job will become ever more important in future years. “All forecasts indicate a further significant increase in container traffic,” says HHLA spokesper- son Karl Olaf Petters. “We must make sure we are ready for that.” Contain- er throughput in Hamburg exceeded 9.7 million TEU in 2014. Even after the planned dredging of the Elbe shipping Traffic | Proactive scheduling avoids lane, this increased cargo volume will unnecessary waiting times. require intelligent coordination. Not only will there be more oceangoing ships requiring high tide to enter the port of Hamburg on the Elbe river. The number of extremely long and wide vessels claiming lots of space on the river will grow, as well. On the river section between Glückstadt and Ham- burg, which is just over 50 km long, the shipping lane is too narrow for two ex- 412 tremely large ‘AGF’ vessels to pass each The need for a centralised author- NTK operations manager. “Coordinating Saving time | While the preliminary Megaboxer | other. The combined breadth in this sec- ity coordinating all this commotion is all this ship traffic early from one central overall view of potential ship encounters The number of tion cannot exceed 90 metres. Mean- too apparent. However, to do this suc- location to optimise the entire system often contains a number of red bars in- giant container- while, more and more AGF ships call at cessfully the authority must get involved is a much smarter approach, even if it dicating conflict situations, the final ver- ships carrying the port of Hamburg. While in 2008 the as early as possible, before dozens of means subordinating individual interests sion prepared by the NTK is mostly free more than total number was 621, the year 2014 giant cargo and cruise ships back up in at times.” of red colour, at least for the next 24- 12,500 TEU has saw a 60 per cent increase, with a total the German Bight. “In the past these big Shipping companies must accept hour period. If everything proceeds as more than 300 of 989 vessels. Adding up all incoming vessels often had to wait in the roads in an occasional waiting time so everybody expected, there should not be any criti- doubled since and outgoing traffic, more than five AGF the North Sea if they failed to liaise with can ultimately operate more profitably. cal ship encounters at the port and down 2012 (see 272 ships were moving within the port and the responsible authorities and pilots be- Working closely with the terminals and the river to the North Sea ever again. diagram). on the river Elbe every day. fore approaching,” explains Gerald Hirt, shipping companies, the NTK team pre- The HPA Nautical Centre checks pare a proposal which they submit to the the commented NTK proposals and Nautical Centre of the Hamburg Port Au- sometimes makes slight adjustments. thority (HPA) for approval, along with a Then the Nautical Centre uses the sched- 200 graphical simulation. ule to organise the ship traffic,  St. Michael Church (132 m) 175

“Alexander von Humboldt” (396 m)

100 Proportions The diagram illustrates the dimensions of the current generation of large containerships – in this example, the “CMA CGM Alexander von Humboldt”. Nearly 400 metres long, the vessel has a capacity of just over 16,000 TEU and was com- I missioned in April 2013. The current world record is a bit over 19,000 TEU, but the Japanese liner company MOL recently ordered six 20,150 TEU ships from the Korean shipyard Samsung Heavy Industries, scheduled for delivery in 2017. In the early 1990’s, 0 300-metre Panamax-class vessels carrying around 5,000 TEU were considered huge. 2012 2013 2014 Block train (700 m) Truck with 40' container (16 m) Panamax class/5,000 TEU (300 m) “Cap San Diego” (160 m) Human (1.80 m)

10 HHLA I HAMBURGER HAFEN UND LOGISTIK AG INGENIOUSSOLUTIONS 11 A RE A N A T B I A L L O T P IC O

R S T E E 40% A

M L 30% I G Intermodal | T

T R Depending on destination, the O U

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ship or train. Cargo leaving

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Hamburg by ship arrives by E

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similar means.

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R U AL E AND EASTERN

“Fuhre 2.0” – more efficient processing. Today a terminal handles between five and 250 trucks per hour, depending on the time of day or On the other hand, if the NTK efficiently.” This is the reason behind Connections | Cargo is delivered night. To distribute container quantities more evenly and get trucks ready faster, HHLA has been implementing its new concept “Fuhre 2.0” (Load coordinators see that a large contain- the gigantic, state-of-the-art contain- and picked up at the port rapidly 2.0) since 2011. This is how it works: A scanner automatically captures data such as the truck registration number and container number. Drivers er vessel could leave port sooner be- er gantries, the fully automated block by choosing the best mode of I can check-in their containers independently within two minutes using self-service terminals. As a truck approaches the check-in gate, any damage cause the river is clear, they will inquire storage facility and Automated Guided transport for each destination. as well as hazardous goods labels are detected and displayed on-screen. Once a container has been pre-checked using the application TR 02 at the terminal whether loading could Vehicles at Altenwerder, a sophisticat- v. 14, the terminal transmits the current container status. This saves the truck operator unnecessary trips. The next step is the slot reservation perhaps be sped up by one or two ed truck logistics concept (see at left) procedure: In future the terminal and the haulage company will agree on a time window for the container delivery or pick-up. This requires prior hours. If so the ship could leave port and excellent cargo train connections electronic data transmission by the dispatcher, and the terminal’s “All Clear”. one tide sooner. to Central and Eastern Europe. Perhaps nobody at the terminal And it is the reason behind the would have even been aware of this NTK. As the year progresses, com- opportunity for an earlier departure. “A munication between the partner ter- shift manager at one of the four big minals within the port and the NTK container terminals in our port cannot regarding arrivals of big ships will be  which is its official responsibili- with a delay, deviating from their shipping see what is happening at any of the consolidated and routed exclusively ty. The NTK’s early intervention to avoid company’s coastal schedule. In such a other terminals or what other huge through the new centre. “This is an potentially costly conflicts between ship- case the navigational staff will contact the ships are intending,” says Hirt. “Here entirely new concept which will bring ping companies, loading terminals and shipping company or the respective ter- at the port of Hamburg with its con- about a major change of culture here port service providers suits the purposes minals to coordinate the remaining jour- fined conditions we must continue to at the port,” says Gerald Hirt. Be that of the HPA perfectly. If the coordinators ney. “We are always on track in real time,” look for new, smart solutions and ways as it may, the benefits clearly speak manage to top this by “cutting the overall says Gerald Hirt who, as head of FLZ op- to handle the available resources more for themselves. time the ships spend in port” (Lünstedt), erations, is also in charge of the NTK (see everybody will be pleased and thankful for bottom right) the resulting cost savings. To accomplish this, the NTK ex- Recommendations | If it turns out, for perts must begin observing the vessels example, that a containership with a crit- long before they approach Hamburg, us- ical draught will depart from England with Gerald Hirt not only heads the NTK but also the Feeder Logistics Centre (FLZ). He and ing ship position data acquired by satellite, a three-hour delay and therefore miss the his team work to optimise and accelerate the handling of feeder vessels at the port of terrestrial antennas and other means. For high tide for entering the river Elbe, the Hamburg. Feeders pick up containers delivered by ocean-going vessels at various termi- example, Lünstedt and his team begin NTK employee on duty will inform the I nals and take them to their destinations, mainly in the Baltic region – and vice versa. This tracking containerships coming from the shipping company or terminal accordingly: requires sophisticated logistics, helped by the FLZ’s experts. The FLZ team maintain Far East as soon as they pass Gibraltar. “Your vessel might consider slowing down contact with shipping companies, shipmasters and terminals around the clock and are Doing so helps the NTK determine wheth- and conserving some fuel because it will able to access their control monitors directly – Hirt calls this “One-stop traffic control”. er a vessel will reach subsequent ports of not be able to make it into port until the call, such as Rotterdam or Southampton, next high tide.”

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