False Bay can become a bay of plenty
ALONGSIDE the outer wall at Simon’s Town harbour for several weeks, the small tug, Ndongeni, and the barge Ubhejane with its small crane form an interesting story. In response to Cape Town’s water crisis, the underwater project company Subtech won a contract to lay the intake pipelines and the outflow brine pipeline for the desalination plant at Monwabisi Beach on the False Bay coast.
The company’s pipe-laying operation, using the tug and barge, has been completed and the rest of the project – undertaken by others – should be finished shortly.
Weather permitting, the tug with Ubjejane in tow was due to sail for Durban yesterday.
The fisheries research ship Ellen Khuzwayo was also at the outer wall last week, while one of the patrol vessels has been alongside in Simon’s Town for a while. The mailship St Helena, her successor on the island trade, Helena, drydocked in the Selborne Graving Dock in Simon’s Town last year, and a few trawlers occasionally enter the bay to use the synchrolift at the naval port. Apart from these, False Bay has not seen a large merchant ship since the rather tired bulker, Panos Earth, was towed into the bay by Smit Amandla (now SA Amandla) in March 2012. The old timer stayed in the bay for more than two months before her sale to a foreign scrapyard.
Traversed rarely these days even by naval vessels, the vast bay remains largely empty, a sad sight that caused me to wonder at the waste of this magnificent stretch of water. What, I mused, would the energetic, resourceful and farsighted Singaporean maritime sector have done with this bay, sheltered from heavy swell for most of the year, despite the south-easter?
For starters, their land-based oppos would have cleared the sand that has covered the railway line at Simon’s Town for about two months, a token of disgraceful neglect on the part of Metrorail that has inconvenienced thousands of people, including many who work in the naval dockyard.
I am sure the Singaporeans would look at the wider picture as well. Responding to the needs of the busy shipping lane with 70 ships passing each day within a few nautical miles of the bay an attractive market for stores, bunkers, repairs and maintenance, that is neglected by local planners – they would plan extensive maritime developments in the bay.
From the first entry by a Dutch East Indiaman, False Bay has had a long history of maritime activities, including naval involvement in a minor skirmish at Muizenberg in 1795. Notable was the establishment of the Royal Naval anchorage in Simon’s Bay, evolving to a full naval base, harbour and drydock that were taken over by the South African Navy in 1957.
Those taking the sea air at vantage points along the coast from Fish Hoek to Miller’s Point in June 1932 had a good view of the new Norwegian whale factory ship Vestfold and seven whalers when they anchored in False Bay, rather than berthing in Cape Town where changes in the gold standard had made port dues expensive.
Five of those whalers were the first Panamanian ships in Simon’s Bay. The whaling fleet joined six whalers that had already anchored in the bay, awaiting the arrival of the Thor Dahl’s Factory Ship Thorshammer from Norway, before the fleet headed south for its annual whale slaughter.
A local fishing vessel brought fresh water to the whaling fleet, and stores came out in a number of small vessels, enjoying the unexpected bonanza that presented a far easier way of earning revenue than fishing in the often heavy seas beyond Cape Point.
A few months later, another Norwegian factory ship, Ole Wegger, refuelled her six whalers in the bay and then anchored close to the harbour while fishing vessels conveyed stores to the fleet.
Apart from hundreds of ships – including the three largest ships of the time, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Mary and Aquitania – that anchored off Simon’s Town during the two world wars, some merchant ships have come into False Bay for various reasons, some to anchor while repairing machinery or even storm damage.
Over the years, dozens of ship-to-ship transfers of oil cargoes have been completed successfully, some involving lightening operations whereby part of the cargo of a deep-draughted vessel was transferred to another tanker to enable the larger vessel – or both – to enter a local port.
Structural failures to several ships, such as the VLCC Tochal (severe bow damage) and the iron ore carrier Cape Africa (loss of side plating and threatened failure of bulkheads), resulted in the vessels being in the bay for weeks while cargo was trans-shipped.
These successful operations – without a drop of oil being spilled – strengthens the argument for the bay to be used regularly for bunkering, ship-to-ship transfers and other operations.
Given that the country is not fighting a war, the under-utilised naval dockyard at Simon’s Town harbour should see more merchant ship activity, although warships should obviously have preferential use of its drydock.
I recall being surprised to see a Cape Town harbour tug arrive off Simon’s Town – back in 1999 – followed closely by Snowflower, one of those magnificent reefer ships that once carried South African fruit to Europe.
One of her sisterships arrived the following day to double-bank while the pair underwent their pre-season lay-up and maintenance programme that included drydocking. Another pair refitted in Simon’s Town the following year.
If the government is serious about job creation, all options should be on the table, including an aggressive campaign to extend maritime operations in places such as False Bay. Could we see floating docks somewhere along the False Bay coast? If a large drydock is not to be built in Cape Town, should not all possible sites along the False Bay coast be explored? One site that comes to mind is the coastline adjacent to the former explosives factory between Macassar and Strand; another is on the seaward side of Simon’s Town harbour.
False Bay is an environmentally sensitive area, yet no more so than Algoa Bay in which there are also beaches, an island and seabird colonies, and in which a busy ship-to-ship bunkering business is conducted by foreigners.
The green lobby will quake at the thought, but is there some merit in building breakwaters or artificial barrier reefs along False Bay’s northern coast with a view to providing shelter for floating docks or even that big drydock?
These structures can become special and flourishing habitats, teeming with marine life, and creating leisure and commercial fishing opportunities, including aquaculture that, apart from the potential to feed the nation, presents significant potential for job creation.
Like most others, I deplore wanton coastal destruction, but I also see a dire need for jobs that can be generated by carefully planned maritime development, even in False Bay. Therefore, let a team of real scientists (not starry-eyed irrationals), economists and maritime specialists conduct a study of the economic potential of False Bay, how it can be used to swell the country’s maritime sector, and, in the process, how it can bring bread to the tables of more people.
Perhaps among its findings, such a study will also recommend that more desalination plants be installed along the False Bay coast, bringing the tug Ngongeni and her crane barge back to the bay. And remember that, from a swamp and a run-down city, those astute Singaporeans created the most advanced south-east Asian city that is also the most prominent oriental maritime hub.
Can False Bay – and greater Cape Town – become the Singapore of Africa? Yes, it can. We simply need to think beyond the present.
Traversed rarely even by naval vessels, the vast bay remains largely empty, a sad sight that caused me to wonder at the waste of this magnificent stretch of water