It’s been 40 years since SA first got its containerisation gulls in a row
FOUR decades ago on Saturday, Safmarine’s freighter SA Morgenster came alongside the semi-completed container terminal, symbolically discharged one 20-foot container and, after guests had enjoyed a pleasant luncheon, she returned to the Duncan Dock to complete cargowork.
That was on July 1, 1977, the so-called C-Day that marked the official inauguration of the South Africa-Europe Container Service (SAECS).
Most other long-haul services had been containerised long before the South Africans got their gulls in a row, but that was probably a blessing as the local folks could avoid the headwinds experienced by other countries in containerisation.
During the 1967-75 Suez closure, officials had visited some of the diverted containerships that gave locals a good insight into containership operations.
From 1971, Unicorn had operated its small ro-ro containership Voorloper along the coast and had pioneered much of the extensive infrastructure.
Container terminals were under construction; railway trucks, road trailers, container depots, huge gantry cranes and straddle carriers in the terminals and a vast computerised network had to be in place before the complex container system could operate.
Preparations for the introduction of large-scale containerisation also needed the buy-in of major customers. Safmarine and its Conference Lines’ partners had taken a roadshow countrywide to explain the intricacies of the new system to commerce, industry and agriculture.
Some customers doubted the sustainability of container shipping, and when officials explained to an agricultural organisation that the surrounds of strategic railway sidings would have to be modified to load containers from the end, some audiences were incredulous. “Ag nee, man!” exclaimed one gent during a show-n-tell meeting in the southern Karoo: “We have loaded wool into railway trucks from the side for years, and now we have to load them from the end!” Shaking his head at this heresy, he drew on his pipe, climbed into his bakkie and drove off at speed. For several years, containers had been carried as deck cargo by most ships – including the weekly mailships – on South Africa-Europe services.
They were not designed to carry large numbers of containers. As an interim measure before the introduction of nine 2 500-TEU and three 1 310-TEU custom-built containerships, Safmarine and their Dutch partners had lengthened some of their freighters, inserting an extra hold for containers and an extra set of derricks.
Ellerman’s chartered City of Pretoria became the first ship to carry a full load of containers from Europe, but Lloyd Triestino’s 1 310-TEU fully cellular containership Africa created a stir when she berthed in Cape Town in 1977, the first of the vessels specially built for the local trade. She and her two sister-ships had a large structure abaft the accommodation to stow “port-hole” containers for the carriage of refrigerated cargoes.
This inefficient system, which blew cold air through the containers, was replicated in some holds in the larger containerships, but was replaced by slots for conventional electrically-powered reefer containers. When that happened, the Big Blue Shed that had been built adjacent to the Cape Town container terminal to accommodate those porthole containers awaiting shipment was decommissioned. (Stripped of its cellguides, it would have made a perfect indoor sports centre!)
In November 1977, Table Bay arrived in Cape Town, the longawaited first of the “large” containerships built for the South African service, and Safmarine’s SA Helderberg followed in January 1978.
In terms of their 2 500-TEU capacity, the nine ships were minnows when compared to the big ‘uns (over 9 000 TEU) currently trading to South Africa, but minute against the 22 000-TEU containerships now on the Asia-Europe trade, nine times the capacity of Table Bay and her consorts!