Chinese Ship Arrives at Payra Port as Five Advanced Equipment Boost Terminal Operations
After a two-year hiatus, a Chinese-flagged vessel named Fan Zhou-6 has berthed at the first terminal of Payra Port in Kalapara, Patuakhali. The vessel arrived at the terminal directly on Wednesday morning carrying five modern cargo-handling equipment purchased by the port.
The equipment include two quay gantry cranes with a capacity of 80 tonnes each, two rubber-tyred gantry cranes with a capacity of 40 tonnes each, and a mobile harbour crane with a capacity of 80,000 tonnes. The port authorities said the equipment was purchased to make cargo and container handling operations at the first terminal more modern and efficient.
The 168-metre-long vessel, with a draft of 6 metres, departed from China’s Pingtan Port for Payra on September 18.
Payra Port Chairman Rear Admiral Syed Saif-Ul-Islam said that earlier, the mother vessel MV Zain berthed directly at the port’s first terminal on May 15, 2024, carrying 50,000 metric tonnes of stone and unloaded the cargo. Another mother vessel, MV Da Hong-16, also berthed at the terminal on November 1 that year carrying 48,000 metric tonnes of stone and unloaded its cargo.
The port authorities said various initiatives are being taken to develop Payra as a digitalised port, alongside dredging efforts to address navigability problems in the Rabnabad Channel.
