April 3 - Almajdouie Heavy Lift Transport and Engineering (MHL) has transported super heavy and oversize evaporator modules from Bilfal Heavy Industry to Marafiq IWPP Project Site in Jubail.
The Marafiq Desalination plant will be one of the largest water desalination processing plants in the world and the project transportation activities are ongoing with Almajdouie Heavy Lift (MHL) and Almajdouie PSC Heavylift (MPSC) using SPMTs to move the cargoes.
The desalination plant which is due for completion in 2010 is of national importance and will add 2,750 MW of power and 800,000 cu m per day of desalinated water to Jubail Industrial City and the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
In total, Almajdouie, which is a member of the WWPC, has handled 18 units for Marafiq, with nine units manufactured by Bilfal of Saudi Arabia and the others manufactured in Korea and UAE. Almajdouie has also been involved in loadout of some units in UAE.
With each evaporator weighing 1,810 tonnes and measuring 65 metres long, 22 metres wide and 13 metres high, the only way to handle such a large and heavy loads, along a combination of public and private roads, was with 84 axles of latest generation SPMTs in a 42 axle side-by-side configuration.
MPSC has a team of specially trained operators for SPMT operation, supported by a highly experienced operations team headed by Ely Coyoca, international operations manager.
Initially, it was thought that the evaporators could not be moved by road, but MPSC/MHL concluded "it is a highly complex move, but it is possible". In many areas route modifications were needed including:
- Hard trimming of more than 400 trees in a residential area that had to be maintained throughout the project duration
- Removal and replacement of 108 light posts, and their replacement within strict time windows dictated by the security police
- Crossing of TS-1 major highway, twice. The second crossing was at a very rarely used crossing place which required a simulation model to verify that the SPMTs could pass safely across.
- Removal and replacement within the same day of three sets of signal lights for each move.
- Propping-up of three bridges for the duration of the project.
