November 25 - Finnish project cargo forwarder Oy Hacklin Logistics has been involved in a major project shipment from Northern Europe to China that involved significant hinterland transport headaches.

Oy Hacklin Logistics moved 234, 40 ft open top containers, 11, 40 ft dry cargo containers, 27, 40 ft flat rate containers and 268 items of breakbulk cargo, totalling 5,710 tonnes in weight. Four chartered vessels as well as additional ro-ro movements were required.

The consignments were loaded at Mäntyluoto, Kotka, Turku, Helsinki, Hamburg and Bremerhaven ports with the Oy Hacklin Logistics team managing the entire project through to Xinhui in China. This included full road surveys locally from Zhanjiang port to the final destination some 25 km away.

Challenges faced by the Oy Hacklin Logistics team included the fact that Zhanjiang seaport is not served by the major container lines, with access to the port generally being by barge or smaller feeder vessels with maximum capacities of around 60 teu only.

In was necessary to cross three bridges on route which required special permission from the local transport department in China as the weight limit for each bridge was only 20 tonnes.

In this region of China, the height of overhead electricity cables is around 5.2 m which required Oy Hacklin Logistics to apply to the local power supply department to supervise the transportation of cargo 4.2 m high.

The movement came as Oy Hacklin Logistics, a member of the Project Cargo Network (PCN), saw the appointment of a new managing director at its parent company Oy Hacklin LtdBjörn Palm has earlier served as managing director of Flinter Nordic and Nordic Chartering.