TRIESTE – The Harbor Master’s Office today issued an ordinance to regulate the entry of cruise ships to the berths of Porto Marghera.
The document comes two months after the government’s decision to prevent access to large ships in the Giudecca Canal and San Marco Basin.
As of today, the Harbour Master regulates the transit along the Malamocco-Marghera Canal of passenger ships having at least one of the following characteristics: gross tonnage over 25 thousand tons, length over 180 meters, height from the waterline (air draft) over 35 meters, use of fuel in manoeuvre with sulfur content equal to or greater than 0.1%.
The measure introduces some additional measures concerning the limits of wind intensity during the transit of ships from the Malamocco inlet to the “diffuse docking places” of the Fusina and Vecon terminal.
The ordinance is divided into five articles. The various prescriptions that ships will have to use to allow an emergency stop in the reduced spaces of the channel also impose speed limits. In particular: “10 knots… from the Malamocco inlet to the crossbar of the Cunetta channel outlet, near Fusina”; “6 knots… once passed the crossbar of the Cunetta channel outlet, near Fusina, up to the mooring”.
The navigation from the crossbeam of the mouth of the Cunetta channel, near Fusina, to the mooring place, moreover, shall be assisted by tugs “with turned cable” and “dyneema type cables, with certified breaking load not less than 250 tons”.
In the meantime, due to weather problems, the Holland Lines Eurodam was today diverted to Trieste after having given up entering Porto Marghera. From Trieste, the departure to the next destination in Greece was delayed due to the Bora wind. The Eurodam, on September 12, had been the first large ship to berth at the Vecon terminal in Marghera after the “big ships” decree.