Don't get washed up

It’s amazing what you can find out. Apparently, if you come into Jeddah seaport by ship you have to navigate around a large coral reef. In the course of writing the June issue I came across an interesting website which showed pictures of various ships that had become stuck on the reefs and been written off by their insurance companies. Some of them had been there for years.

What made it even more interesting was that the author had jotted down the names and registrations, or whatever ships have and looked up pictures of the vessels when they were in their prime. One in particular, a roll-on ferry lately called the Saudi Golden Arrow caught my eye.

Advertisement

FEATURED COMMENT Please click here to comment on this article

There were photos of the day it was launched, with flags fluttering way back in 1957, pictures of it in service through the 1970s and 1980s, where it changed hands and colours several times. Finally, there were pictures of it as a sad ruin, beached on the reef since the year 2000.

How is this relevant to PMV? Well, strictly speaking it isn’t, though the development of the Red Sea Port is extremely exciting. New machinery and millions of dollars are being poured into the project, along with concrete at the rate of 100m3 per hour. Chinese engineers have brought in a mixture of Asian and European machinery including conveyors and heavy duty pumps and it is a race against the clock to get it finished on schedule.

It’s the same story across the Western region at the moment, with new awards being made for a line-up of interesting new road and rail projects, as well as ambitious plans for a million homes in a single development.

Find out more now, while there are still tenders available… less you end up stranded in dangerous water, while the action happens inland.

 

---