CICT provides berth for weather-damaged ship MOL-Cosmos

• MOL recognises expert stevedore services at CICT 

Motor vessel MOL-Cosmos was compelled to divert to the Port of Colombo, as a port of refuge, from her normal service route, due to having faced very severe and bad weather conditions in the central Arabian Sea closer to Mumbai.

The weather conditions she faced were so bad that over 25 empty containers which were stowed on deck broke from the lashings and got washed away into the high seas. The vessel arrived at the Port of Colombo with some containers fully crushed and still others hanging over the shipside and inter-locked with multiple containers.

The vessel was safely brought alongside the berth at the Colombo International Container Terminals (CICT) berth, by the pilots of the Sri Lanka Ports Authority. This was done after all the necessary inspections had been carried out by the relevant authorities to ensure the safety of navigation and avoid any potential risks to the safe navigation of ships within the habour basin. 

Prior to the vessel coming alongside the CICT berth, the operations team from CICT boarded the vessel for a pre-inspection. After carrying out a detailed inspection, the CICT team made a comprehensive action plan with a dedicated team of ship-to-shore gantry operators and experienced stevedores. 

For the next stage this team initiated a meeting with the operations team of the ship’s local agent MOL (Lanka). Once the final plan proposed by the CICT team was accepted, it was a matter of waiting for 36 hours for the berth to fall vacant at CICT. 

No sooner the berth was available and the ship was brought alongside, team CICT went straight into action. The key focus of the full team at all times was safety, and as per comments from the ship’s officers, they were very impressed with the professional expertise with which the full operation was carried out by the crane drivers and the supporting staff. They commented that this was a very complex operation which was way out of the standard terminal stevedore operation, and as such the very high level of professionalism of the CICT terminal staff was something to be commended.  

MOL (Lanka) Managing Director Chandima Hulangamuwa, on behalf of MOL Liner Ltd., has placed on record his appreciation to CICT for a complex job done very professionally, safely and within the estimated time frames. 

CICT is proud to have been able to provide this expertise to MOL at a time of need, and is also thankful to the SLPA for providing the safe navigation and berthing/unberthing of the vessel.