The Port of Ngqura

The port of Ngqura is near completion. Hundreds of hours of strenuous work and labour have been put into completing this port. It is South Africa’s 8th and latest commercial port development, and is situated at the mouth of the Coega River in Algoa Bay. The National Ports Authority of SA is responsible for developing the deepwater port. 
 
Coega’s Industrial Development Zone has been developed over the 12,000 hectare site in the area including the river and port.

The port is of deepwater construction capable of serving post-Panamax dry and liquid bulkers and the new generation of cellular container ships.

Just how much work goes into developing a port anyway?

Interestingly, The new port consists of a main eastern breakwater, 2,7 km in length extending into Algoa Bay to a maximum water depth of 18 metres, and a secondary western breakwater 1,125 km in length.
 
5 berths will be used specifically for mooring vessels while not at sea which total 1,800m of quay wall.  A total of 32 berths have been identified in the developed port. 

The main breakwater is the longest in South Africa! Both breakwaters consist of rubble mound construction; with 2,300,000 m³ of armour rock each of 3 to 6 tonnes! A layer of 30 tonne concrete blocks known as dolosse were put in place to provide the breakwater protection. There are 25 000 of these units cast on site and placed in position. That’s 750 000 tons of dolosse! The restriction of the breakwater required 102,000 m³ of mass concrete, with 5 caissons anchoring the ends of the breakwaters which required 18,000 m³ of reinforced concrete. The quay walls are approximately 6m above mean sea level.
 
The inner harbour works required 13.8 million cubic metres of material to be dug out and to achieve this, an area of 300,000 m² had to be dewatered down to 20m below sea level!
 
A sand bypass system has also been put in place consisting of jet pumps to divert sand affected by the littoral drift. 

Clearly, an incredible amount of work, time and money has been invested in Coega’s Port of Ngqura. It has become a buzz with development and investment!