THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Vizhinjam International Seaport, strategically positioned on the southern peninsula of Kerala, has clocked a phenomenal milestone in global maritime logistics. The deep-water transshipment facility has emerged as one of the fastest ports across the globe to successfully orchestrate the handling of 1,000 vessels in under two years from the formal initiation of its cargo operations.
The landmark achievement was finalized on Wednesday evening with the grand arrival of the ultra-large container mothership, MSC Luciana, which was granted a festive ceremonial welcome including a traditional water salute by harbor tugs. Senior leadership executives from Vizhinjam International Seaport Ltd (VISL) and Adani Vizhinjam Port Private Ltd (AVPPL) gathered at the quayside to receive the vessel, marking a defining moment for the port’s rapid ascendance as a major global maritime transshipment hub.
The multi-billion dollar port facility has continuously broken national and international performance benchmarks since its project inception. The terminal initiated its trial operations in July 2024 and subsequently executed its full-scale commercial commissioning in December 2024. Within this condensed timeline, the transshipment terminal has rapidly processed a cumulative volume exceeding 2 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of containerized cargo, effectively becoming the fastest Indian port asset to cross this highly coveted industrial threshold.
What makes this exponential growth curve remarkably unique is that Vizhinjam’s operational scaling remained completely insulated from the severe geopolitical frictions and localized war situations in West Asia. While these conflicts caused widespread stagnation and logistical bottlenecks across major global shipping lanes during the same fiscal period, Vizhinjam consistently recorded month-on-month traffic gains.
The port’s diversified traffic portfolio includes hosting 67 Ultra Large Container Vessels (ULCV) measuring approximately 400 meters in length. Notable calls include the MSC Irina—the world’s largest operational container carrier—and the MSC Verona, which represents one of the deepest-draft vessels to ever navigate into an Indian harbor basin. This latest operational milestone is backed by a steady climb in port efficiency; in May alone, the terminal processed an all-time monthly high of 1,30,863 TEUs across 55 port calls, outperforming its previous historic high of 1.23 lakh TEUs registered in January 2026.
Throughout these high-density peak operational windows, the port smoothly maintained an exceptional gross crane ratio of over 30 moves per hour, reflecting world-class container handling speed. This aggressive scaling trajectory is a direct extension of its early successes, such as in October 2025, when the deep-water facility welcomed its 500th ship within just 10 months of launching its commercial business.
Meticulous local operational expertise has been an irreplaceable cornerstone in sustaining the strict engineering precision required for these global milestones. Waterline Shipping and Logistics Private Ltd, a native Thiruvananthapuram-based maritime enterprise, has successfully commanded the high-risk mooring activities for all 1,000 vessels that have berthed at the port, tracing back to the historic arrival of the first heavy cargo project vessel, the Zhen Hua 15, back in October 2023.
Vessel mooring remains an incredibly high-precision and hazardous maritime assignment at Vizhinjam due to the intense challenges presented by changing local weather matrices and strong under-keel ocean currents. What distinguishes Waterline’s terminal operations is its core dedicated workforce of 28 personnel, all of whom were directly selected from the immediate local coastal fishing communities and put through specialized technical training modules. This native team recently completed advanced technical certifications on the automated Shore Tension System—a state-of-the-art mooring technology introduced for the very first time in India at Vizhinjam—which neutralizes heavy wave wave energy and drastically improves overall berth productivity.
ലഘു വിവരണം
പ്രവർത്തനം ആരംഭിച്ച് രണ്ട് വർഷത്തിനുള്ളിൽ ആയിരം കപ്പലുകൾ കൈകാര്യം ചെയ്ത് വിഴിഞ്ഞം അന്താരാഷ്ട്ര തുറമുഖം ചരിത്രപരമായ നാഴികക്കല്ല് പിന്നിട്ടു. ബുധനാഴ്ച വൈകുന്നേരം എത്തിയ എംഎസ്സി ലൂസിയാന എന്ന ഭീമൻ മദർഷിപ്പോടെയാണ് ഈ നേട്ടം പൂർത്തിയായത്. പശ്ചിമേഷ്യൻ പ്രതിസന്ധികൾക്കിടയിലും 2024 ഡിസംബറിലെ വാണിജ്യ ഉദ്ഘാടനത്തിന് ശേഷം 20 ലക്ഷത്തിലധികം കണ്ടെയ്നറുകളാണ് തുറമുഖം കൈകാര്യം ചെയ്തത്. തീരദേശവാസികളായ 28 യുവാക്കൾക്ക് അത്യാധുനിക ‘ഷോർ ടെൻഷൻ സിസ്റ്റം’ പരിശീലനം നൽകി കപ്പലുകളുടെ സുരക്ഷിതമായ മൂറിംഗ് നിർവ്വഹിച്ച തദ്ദേശീയ കമ്പനിയായ വാട്ടർലൈൻ ഷിപ്പിംഗിന്റെ പങ്കും ഈ നേട്ടത്തിൽ നിർണ്ണായകമാണ്.
(With inputs from TNIE)
For more details: Navamalayalam.com