Year-long logistics planning pays off for Mozambican mine

23 Oct 2013 - by Ed Richardson

Landing 48-metre pontoons
weighing over 100 tons
each on to a remote beach
in northern Mozambique
was part of the day’s work for the
team that shipped over 100000
cubic metres of freight weighing
15 million kilograms for the
Moma Sands mine in northern
Mozambique.
Röhlig
Grindrod was
responsible
for the total
logistics
function. It took
“a good few
months to plan
the logistics,”
says Rayno
van Niekerk,
managing director of Röhlig-
Grindrod Mozambique.
He is based in Maputo,
Mozambique, where the company
offers specialised services in
exports, imports, in-transit
shipments, transportation of
project cargo, vehicles, raw
materials, break bulk and
containerised cargo, as well as
customs clearing.
In the middle of 2010 Röhlig-
Grindrod presented EP+C with a
programme based on feasibility
and road studies, consolidation
and packing plans, multimodal
transportation management,
exact stowage planning,
statistical calculations, risk
management, handling, choice of
appropriate loading equipment,
personal loading and unloading
supervision, documentation and
customs clearance, and web-based
tracking and tracing options were
included in the highly complex
project plan, he says.
The project started in January
2011.
Moma is the world’s largest
titanium deposit. It is located
160 kilometres from the city
of Nampula, and is owned and
operated by Kenmare Resources.
Kenmare doubled the capacity
of the mine, with construction
work starting in December 2010.
Total production of heavy
mineral concentrate (HMC) for
2012 was 772300 tons, according
to Kenmare chairman Justin
Loasby.
In his
introduction
to the 2012
Kenmare
annual
report, he
says the mine
produced
574000 tons
of ilmenite
and 46900
tons of zircon.
Some 680000 tons of finished
product was shipped in 2012,
generating revenues of US$234.6
million – 40% up from the
US$167.5 million in 2011.
Vessels are loaded through
a dedicated
jetty, which
handled 39
vessels in the
2012 financial
year. Kenmare
supplements
the jetty with a
barge system.
Röhlig-
Grindrod also
had to make
use of barges for the discharge of
the project cargo.
An exposed beach operating
system (EBOS) system was used
to land 15 pontoons measuring 48
metres in length, 5.4m in width,
3.8m in height and weighing 107
tons each. They were offloaded on
to a geared barge.
A careful watch had to be kept
on the weather as the barges could
not operate in swells greater than
2.5 metres.
“We obtained daily reports from
ocean satellite imaging systems to
monitor the weather. During the
duration of the project we had to
cope with a few tropical storms
that developed into cyclones – one
of which was
Irina,” says
Liz Gaynor,
national
projects
manager
Mozambique
for Röhlig-
Grindrod.
“As a result
we experienced
some delays in
discharging from the vessels and
barges”.
Once the pontoons had been
landed on the beach they were
loaded on seven-axle trailers with
a capacity of 150 tons and carried
some six kilometres from the
beach to site.
The logistics processes became
even more challenging during the
November to April wet season,
when 80% of the annual rainfall
falls in the region.
“In March 2013 when flooding
prohibited us from getting trucks
to the site, we had to hire a selfpropelled
barge to ship the cargo
by sea from Nampula to Moma
Sands,” says Gaynor.
But, the challenge started at the
point of manufacture in Richards
Bay some 700 nautical miles away.
Traffic lights had to be moved
and overhead electrical cables
removed in order to transport
a 7.5-metre high by 10-metre
diameter surge bin just five
kilometres from where it was built
to the port.
The remainder of the cargo
was discharged in Nacala and
transported by road to Moma
Sands.
In total, 100000 tons of cargo
was delivered from suppliers in
Australia, the USA and South
Africa to the Moma mine – not
only in the right order but also
according to a defined schedule,
says Gaynor, who was based in
Johannesburg for the operation.
Röhlig-Grindrod had dedicated
staff stationed at Moma Sands and
the client’s premises in Centurion,
as well as Johannesburg and
Durban, for the duration of the
project.
The project was completed
by May 2013, when the last
consignment of freight arrived at
the destination.
Kenmare has since
commissioned the new plant.