OREANDA-NEWS. October 10, 2011. Rosmorport is set to complete the deepening of the North approach channel by October 30, the federal enterprise said.

As of now, the approach channel dredging has been completed by nearly 99 percent, Rosmorport said adding that overall the state project’s contractor is to dredge 8,571 million cbm of soil.

In February, 2011, Roneftbunker, the owner of Ust-Luga liquid bulk terminal completed building of the facility’s berths and in May, Rosmorport commenced the construction of the North approach channel.

The 17.5m-deep harbor, channel and berths will enable access of Suezmax tankers, which could dock at the Rosneftbunker’s Export Oil Terminal and making a loop exit the port of Ust-Luga.

The first test call of Suezmax vessel is expected at the port of Ust-Luga’s Oil Terminal in late October. Earlier, Deputy Transport Minister Viktor Olersky had announced the start of crude oil shipments from the port of Ust-Luga from November. Transneft’s President Nikolay Tokarev also had told reporters that the company is ready to handle on Nov. 30 the first tanker at the port that will transport export crude oil.