By Pacific Island Times News Staff
The Port Authority of Guam today began unloading cargo from the American President Lines CC Herodote, which arrived dockside at 6:23 a.m. today with 225 containers to unload.
As of this afternoon, port personnel had moved more than half the containers off the ship. The Port offloaded 148 containers using Gantry 5 and APL’s ship’s
Matson's Maunawili left the Port at 4:52 a.m. after 566 cargo containers were offloaded. Due to push-to-talk services being entirely down, port employees took pen to paper and went “old school” to process the movement and release of cargo containers.
The Port received 52 hand-held land mobile radio devices from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to support cargo operations.
On Saturday, , the Port Authority requested radio devices from on-island FEMA representatives when the island’s communication system collapsed due to Typhoon Mawar.
“We immediately identified our vulnerabilities at the Port following the damages caused by Typhoon Mawar and requested FEMA to provide radio communications,"Port General Manager Rory J. Respicio said.
"Thankfully, 52 units were identified on island and two FEMA technicians spent the day programming these devices. We will do a test run before deploying these FEMA assets to our employees," he added.
Respicio noted that the lack of communication tools hindered operations and posed a safety issue when discharging cargo.
“These FEMA assets are a big help as we continue to provide uninterrupted service to our island community. We are grateful for strong community partnerships that support our mission at such a critical time," Respicio said.