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Displaying items by tag: Tom Roe Point Terminal

#PORTS & SHIPPING – Drogheda Port set a record tonnage cargo with the arrival of Arklow Bridge (2011/4,723grt) last week. The vessel operated by Arklow Shipping N.V. as previously reported on Afloat.ie had carried 7,125 tonnes of maize, the largest ever single cargo handled in the Co. Louth port, writes Jehan Ashmore.

Arklow Bridge is the  second 'B' class vessel that was built last year and the Dutch-flagged vessel loaded the cargo of  maize in the Polish city of Gdynia for Comex McKinnon. The company is a leading player in the importation and trading of feedstuffs for the animal feed sector in Ireland.

Stevedoring services were handled by Fast Terminals, a new company which is a joint venture between Drogheda Port Company and Fast Shipping of Antwerp. The company became operational last Septemberand increases the number of stevedoring operations in the port to four.

Drogheda Port is developing its agri-sector business so to transport feedstuffs for the animal feed sector in Ireland. The agri-food sector is worth €7.8bn and is proving resilient, despite the downturn and growth from this indigenous sector will be vital to the country's overall economic recovery.

According to Drogheda Port Company, planning permission was recently received for the development of a 5,400sq m bulk storage facility at the Tom Roes Point Terminal. The downriver facility is situated closer to the open sea compared to the  towns quays on the banks of the Boyne.

Mr Paul Fleming, Drogheda Port Chief Executive said "Drogheda Port continues to provide a strategic import and export location for our customers with a service which is more flexible and cost competitive than other larger ports".

He added: "This is helping us to win new contracts and grow our business in addition to providing a platform to Ireland's importers and exporters to reach their markets more cost competitively."

Mr Simon Mulvany, Director of Fast Terminals said "Fast Terminals has identified the competitive opportunities that Drogheda Port can offer our company. Despite the current economic downturn we intend to invest in the port and develop our facilities to cater for further growth in the future."

Published in Ports & Shipping

Coastal Notes Coastal Notes covers a broad spectrum of stories, events and developments in which some can be quirky and local in nature, while other stories are of national importance and are on-going, but whatever they are about, they need to be told.

Stories can be diverse and they can be influential, albeit some are more subtle than others in nature, while other events can be immediately felt. No more so felt, is firstly to those living along the coastal rim and rural isolated communities. Here the impact poses is increased to those directly linked with the sea, where daily lives are made from earning an income ashore and within coastal waters.

The topics in Coastal Notes can also be about the rare finding of sea-life creatures, a historic shipwreck lost to the passage of time and which has yet many a secret to tell. A trawler's net caught hauling more than fish but cannon balls dating to the Napoleonic era.

Also focusing the attention of Coastal Notes, are the maritime museums which are of national importance to maintaining access and knowledge of historical exhibits for future generations.

Equally to keep an eye on the present day, with activities of existing and planned projects in the pipeline from the wind and wave renewables sector and those of the energy exploration industry.

In addition Coastal Notes has many more angles to cover, be it the weekend boat leisure user taking a sedate cruise off a long straight beach on the coast beach and making a friend with a feathered companion along the way.

In complete contrast is to those who harvest the sea, using small boats based in harbours where infrastructure and safety poses an issue, before they set off to ply their trade at the foot of our highest sea cliffs along the rugged wild western seaboard.

It's all there, as Coastal Notes tells the stories that are arguably as varied to the environment from which they came from and indeed which shape people's interaction with the surrounding environment that is the natural world and our relationship with the sea.