The Hindu Business Line : Kolkata port to invite EoIs for night navigation

KOLKATA Port Trust will soon invite Expressions of Interest (EoIs) for putting up facilities along the Hooghly river for night navigation to enable ship movement to and from the Kolkata Dock System (KDS). No night movement of ships is permitted at present.

The creation of facilities for night navigation, according to Dr A.K. Chanda, Chairman of KoPT, will be in three parts. First, installing shore lights between the Kolkata Dock System and Diamond Harbour stretch of the river; second, installing buoy lights between Diamond Harbour and Sagar Island stretch and finally, installing VTMS (vessel traffic management system) at three locations, namely, Hugli Point, Falta and Panchpara, all along the river.

If everything proceeded as per plan, night navigation should become operational from April next year. With this, the average turnaround time would vastly improve as the waiting period of ships either at the Sandheads, the mouth of the Hooghly river, or in the dock would substantially drop, Dr Chanda said.

Earlier, decades ago, KoPT did try to launch night navigation but without much success. The large-scale pilferage of buoy lights and other problems rendered movement of ships at night along the navigable stretch of the river impossible. The present move, therefore, is to involve private firms who, it is felt, should be better equipped to stop pilferage and render hassle-free service.

KoPT already has a sophisticated VTMS operational at Sagar Island to guide vessels between the island and the Sandheads. The proposed VTMS, which will be much smaller in size and capacity, as and when installed at the three locations, should help guide vessels along the river at night.

The total cost of the creation of facilities for night navigation is estimated at Rs 10 crore.

Meanwhile, the KDS in July handled 18,606 TEUs, highest container throughput in any single month, surpassing the previous best of 17,685 TEUs in May this year. Cumulatively, in the first four months of the current fiscal (April to July), total container throughput at KDS was 67,011 TEUs as compared to 48,407 TEUs in the same period last year. During the same period, Haldia dock's container throughput was 34,290 TEUs (42,500 TEUs).

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