Samson and Goliath (cranes)
Encyclopedia
Shipbuilding
Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to before recorded history.Shipbuilding and ship repairs, both...
gantry crane
Gantry crane
Gantry cranes, bridge cranes, and overhead cranes, are all types of cranes which lift objects by a hoist which is fitted in a hoist trolley and can move horizontally on a rail or pair of rails fitted under a beam...
s situated at Queen's Island, Belfast
Belfast
Belfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...
, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
. The cranes, which were named after the Biblical
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
figures Samson
Samson
Samson, Shimshon ; Shamshoun or Sampson is the third to last of the Judges of the ancient Israelites mentioned in the Tanakh ....
and Goliath, dominate the Belfast skyline and are landmark structures of the city.
History
The cranes are situated in the shipyard of Harland & WolffHarland and Wolff
Harland and Wolff Heavy Industries is a Northern Irish heavy industrial company, specialising in shipbuilding and offshore construction, located in Belfast, Northern Ireland....
and were constructed by the German engineering firm Krupp
Krupp
The Krupp family , a prominent 400-year-old German dynasty from Essen, have become famous for their steel production and for their manufacture of ammunition and armaments. The family business, known as Friedrich Krupp AG Hoesch-Krupp, was the largest company in Europe at the beginning of the 20th...
, with Goliath being completed in 1969 and Samson in 1974. Goliath stands 96 metres (315 ft) tall, while Samson is taller at 106 metres (348 ft). At the time Harland & Wolff was one of the largest shipbuilders in the world. The announcement that they were to be built was an important event at the time. It signalled that one of Northern Ireland's largest employers was to expand at a time when the country's Troubles
The Troubles
The Troubles was a period of ethno-political conflict in Northern Ireland which spilled over at various times into England, the Republic of Ireland, and mainland Europe. The duration of the Troubles is conventionally dated from the late 1960s and considered by many to have ended with the Belfast...
were raging, and consequently inward investment
Inward investment
Inward investment is the injection of money from an external source into a region, in order to purchase capital goods for a branch of a corporation to locate or develop its presence in the region....
was at a low.
Construction
Each crane has a span of 140 metres (459 ft) and can lift loads of up to 840 tonnes to a height of 70 metres (230 ft), making a combined lifting capacity of over 1,600 tonnes, one of the largest in the world. Prior to commissioning, the cranes were tested up to 1,000 tonnes, which bent the gantry downwards by over 30 centimetres (12 in). The dry dockDry dock
A drydock is a narrow basin or vessel that can be flooded to allow a load to be floated in, then drained to allow that load to come to rest on a dry platform...
at the base of the cranes is the largest in the world measuring 556m x 93m.
Decline of Harland & Wolff
At its height Harland & Wolff boasted 35,000 employees and a healthy order book, but in the years following the cranes' construction the workforce and business declined. The last ship to be launched at the yard to date was a roll-on/roll-off ferryFerry
A ferry is a form of transportation, usually a boat, but sometimes a ship, used to carry primarily passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo as well, across a body of water. Most ferries operate on regular, frequent, return services...
in March 2003. Since then the yard has restructured itself to focus less on shipbuilding and more on design and structural engineering, as well as ship repair, offshore construction projects and competing for other projects to do with metal engineering and construction. Initially there was concern that the now largely redundant cranes would be demolished. However later in the year they were scheduled as historic monuments under Article 3 of the Historic Monuments and Archaeological Objects (Northern Ireland) Order 1995.
Northern Ireland Office
Northern Ireland Office
The Northern Ireland Office is a United Kingdom government department responsible for Northern Ireland affairs. The NIO is led by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and is based in Northern Ireland at Stormont House.-Role:...
Minister of the time Angela Smith
Angela Evans Smith
Angela Evans Smith, Baroness Smith of Basildon is a British Labour Co-operative politician who was the Member of Parliament for Basildon from 1997 till she was defeated in 2010...
stated: "These cranes are an essential part of our city, our roots and our culture."
The cranes are to be retained as part of the existing dry dock
Dry dock
A drydock is a narrow basin or vessel that can be flooded to allow a load to be floated in, then drained to allow that load to come to rest on a dry platform...
facility within the restructured shipyard, situated adjacent to the Titanic Quarter
Titanic Quarter, Belfast
The Titanic Quarter in Belfast, Northern Ireland is a waterfront regeneration project, including apartments, a riverside entertainment district, and a major Titanic-themed attraction under development on reclaimed land in Belfast Harbour, known until recently as Queen's Island...
, a business, light industrial, leisure and residential development on land now surplus to the heavy industrial requirements of the shipyard on Queen's Island. They will continue to be used on ship repair projects as well as potential shipbuilding activities in the future.
Recent history
On 4 April 2007, Samson crashed into the long jib of smaller rail-mounted "Henson" tower crane, sending the smaller crane tumbling to the ground. The smaller crane weighed 95 tonnes and stood at a height of 25 m, compared to Samson's 70 m. Three industrial painters working on another rail-mounted crane were close to the jib as it fell, eventually crashing onto the ground. Information about the incident was not released until mobile-phone footage of the event was published on YouTubeYouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
.
In October 2007, Goliath re-entered service after five years, an occurrence described by a company spokesperson as underlining the yard's growing workload.
See also
- Kockums Crane - a 138 metres (453 ft) high crane that was a similar landmark in Malmö, Sweden, before it was removed