World’s largest crawler crane being added at BP’s Whiting plant
Associated Press July 31, 2012 10:59AM
Workers load parts onto a waiting truck for transport Tuesday afternoon at the Port of Indiana Tuesday afternoon. Workers will be offloading 190 pieces of the worlds largest crawler crane to be used at BP in Whiting. | Jeffrey D. Nicholls~Sun-Times Media
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Updated: July 31, 2012 10:24PM
One of the largest cranes in the world arrived at the Port of Indiana-Burns Harbor Monday, the start of its six-week journey to the BP Whiting refinery where it will help the company to finish its expansion project. According to the Ports of Indiana, the 1.65 million pound crawler crane arrived on the ship Elandsgracht in 190 pieces. Port workers will take seven to eight days to unload all of the pieces and then stage them in order of shipment. The pieces will then be shipped by trucks over six weeks to Whiting, with BP assembling the pieces as they come and taking more as they are ready for them, Liz Folkerts, spokeswoman for the ports, said. When put together, the crane will stand 473 feet tall and will lift up to 3,000 tons. The crane came from Netherlands, although it was made in Germany. Folkerts said that because the crane was shipped in pieces, it’s not technically one of the largest items shipped to the Port of Indiana-Burns Harbor, but said that the BP expansion project has seen some of the largest ones shipped to the port. “Because of the experience of our labor force and Federal Marine Terminals, our terminal operator, this port has developed an enviable track record for handling large cargoes and established a world-wide reputation as a port-of-choice for speciality shipments,” Anthony Kuk, port director, said in a release.
