China to develop dredger ‘more powerful than artificial island-builder of South China Sea’
- Self-propelled suction machine will feature a 10,000kW reamer, adding to the country’s fleet
- ‘The new vessel is not just a simple enlargement ... but a qualitative leap forward’: chief engineer
China is developing a record-breaking dredger 50 per cent more powerful than its existing “super island builder”, the project’s chief engineer said.
Both Tian Jing and Tian Kun are owned and operated by the Tianjin Waterway Bureau Co, which has the most powerful dredger fleet in the world.
A dredger is a vessel that can blast through the rock on the bed of a river or the sea with its reamer, suck up rocks and sand and pump them through a pipe over a distance. They are used to clear navigation waterways or to build artificial islands.
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China has invested heavily in its dredging industry and has built about 200 vessels since 2006 to become one of the world’s biggest dredger manufacturers.
Qin said China’s dredger industry must strengthen its self-sufficiency in core technology development to become the industrial leader of the world.
The Tian Jing, or “Celestial Whale”, was jointly designed by Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Germany’s Vosta LMG, and commissioned in 2010. It can excavate 4,500 cubic metres (159,000 cubic feet) of sand per hour, and its powerful pump can send the sand up to 6km (3.7 miles) away.
This unique instrument can reclaim land faster, dredging in one spot and refilling in another without the need to transport landfill material from elsewhere.
The ship reportedly spent 193 days moving among five reefs in the Spratly Islands between September 2013 and June 2014. Its team broke the underwater coral reefs and sucked and stacked them to construct the submerged atolls – Fiery Cross, Mischief and Subi – into the largest land features in the South China Sea and featuring airports, radar arrays and missile positions.
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After the “Great Wall of Sand” was completed in the disputed waters, the Tian Jing Project won the highest prize in China’s National Science and Technology Progress Award in 2019.
The domestically designed Tian Kun vessel, completed in 2017, upgrades the capacity to 6,000 cubic metres per hour, with an ability to send material 15km and dig 35 metres under the sea floor.