Imperial Logistics moves giants

The news in Gauteng earlier this week was abuzz with the specialist road transport of a Boeing 737 from Jet Park to Fourways – but that’s not the only big thing to have been moved recently.

Imperial Logistics recently successfully undertook one of the most challenging and largest transport projects of its kind in the company’s history, when it moved two Magra thickeners from client Magra Process Engineering’s manufacturing plant, in Vereeniging, to Kwekwe in Zimbabwe.

Magra thickeners are used in the mining industry and each weighs just under 30 t and is 11 m long and six metres in diameter.

“It is an incredible feat to complete such an intricate project. What made it unique and especially challenging was the tonnage of the load combined with the abnormal metric dimensions of these single units,” says Johan Truter, CEO of Imperial Managed Solutions.

Planing for the project started in August 2017. “Meticulous analysis and route planning were required to avoid cargo damage along the way. Police escorts and abnormal permits had to be arranged, and Eskom and Telkom were alerted to lift power and telephone lines 35 days before D-day,” Truter explains.

On the day, the Magra thickeners were loaded onto trailers with two cranes; a process that Truter says took about four hours per Magra to complete.

“Once on the road, the vehicles travelled a maximum of eight hours per day, at a speed of no more than 50 km/h. They were always escorted by a police vehicle. The load travelled through Gauteng, Mpumalanga and Limpopo before crossing into Zimbabwe. It was a 12-day journey of more than 1 000 km,” he adds.

Since July 2015, the company has transported more than 100 out-of-gauge loads for Magra, with equipment weighing from 20 to more than 40 t.