3 Massive STS Cranes Transported Across Bosphorus from Haydarpaşa to Mardaş

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In a carefully engineered operation, Turkish heavy lift and transport specialist Hareket has successfully moved three 2,150-ton Ship-to-Shore (STS) cranes from Haydarpaşa Port to Mardaş Port via the Bosphorus Strait, navigating narrow berths, variable dock heights, and high-traffic sea lanes.

Each of the towering STS cranes measured 90 meters in height, 25 meters in width, and spanned 150 meters between their double booms—making them not only the first of their kind in Turkey but also the only double-boom STS cranes in the world.

The operation involved engineering, installation, heavy transport, and sea logistics—all handled in-house by Hareket. The components of the cranes arrived by vessel from Ireland and were unloaded at Haydarpaşa Port based on a detailed layout plan devised by the company’s engineering team. Installation was executed using two high-capacity crawler cranes, with the heaviest single component weighing 250 tons.

But the real challenge wasn’t just size. It was geography.

Haydarpaşa Port, located on the Asian side of Istanbul, offers just 2.20 meters of dock height, while Mardaş Port, on the Marmara Sea coast, stands at 3.60 meters. These height differentials, combined with the cranes’ massive dimensions, narrow berthing space, and the Bosphorus’s notoriously tight strait conditions, meant the route and method required extreme precision.

To ensure safe operations, Hareket engineers made the critical decision to load and unload the cranes from the vessels laterally—landing and disembarking the cargo from the side instead of head-on. This rare approach allowed the team to bypass dock constraints and minimize risk during critical movements.

According to the company, the loading, transportation, and side-disembarkation of all three STS cranes were carried out without incident.

For each crane’s transfer through the Bosphorus, maritime authorities halted strait traffic for 5 hours at a time. The temporary closures were approved and coordinated with the Port Authority and Coastal Safety services to ensure seamless passage of the giant structures.

Altogether, the project mobilized 97 people. This included a 12-person engineering team, a 10-person rigging and crane operations unit, a 45-person heavy lift and assembly crew, and 30 personnel dedicated to ballasting, lashing, and overland transport handling.

Given the limited number of such operations performed globally, Hareket emphasized that the project’s complexity placed it among only a handful of similar efforts ever undertaken. Every step—from the offloading of Irish-built components in Haydarpaşa to final delivery at Mardaş—was pre-engineered and executed with strict adherence to safety and sequencing protocols.

What made these cranes even more remarkable? Their design. With dual booms spanning 150 meters, they stand alone as the world’s only port cranes of this configuration. Now installed at Mardaş, they are set to enhance container handling capacity at the growing terminal, providing operational flexibility and reach for larger vessels calling at the port.