Designed by the Austrian firm Waagner Biro AG, ‘Vulcan’ was a self-propelled floating crane that was capable of lifting loads of up to 120 tonnes at an outreach distance of 10 metres from the fender edge. The $6 million crane was the most sophisticated of its kind in Southeast Asia when it went into operation at the Offshore Supply Terminal of the Port of Singapore Authority in March 1976. In one notable operation, the Vulcan was involved in the unloading of aerobridge sections at Bedok Jetty for transportation to Changi Airport in 1980.At the southern tip of mainland Singapore is a deep harbour first noticed by Sir William Farquhar in 1819. Later referred to simply as New Harbour, major development of the area started in the 1850s when the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O) established operations there. In 1900, the strategically important harbour was renamed Keppel Harbour in honour of Admiral Henry Keppel, a British naval officer with strong ties to Singapore. The Port of Singapore Authority’s Keppel Terminal began operations next to the harbour in 1991 and has since become one of the world’s busiest container terminals.
