NCS' "Navy" servicing Basamuk

July 24, 2009

The Basamuk site is the processing plant for Ramu Nico’s mine operations at Kurumbukari. It is only accessible by boat, and managed by our NCS office in Madang.

At Basamuk we feed in excess of 900 Chinese and National staff three meals each day.

NCS Assistant Operations Manager, Allan Atava said that in the early days at Basamuk, food delivery was done by stinger boats.

“When the weather is good, it takes approximately 3 hours to cross Astrolabe Bay to the Basamuk site from Madang, 5 hours during rough seas in the winter months.” Said Allan.

“We required at least two of these boats doing three trips a week. This turned out to be a very expensive exercise. It was a major challenge to deliver the volume of food needed to feed our customers every day – so decisions had to be made.” He said

An opportunity arose for NCS Raibus to purchase a local boat, The Waria, a 42 foot long stainless steel hulled fishing boat, to transport frozen, dry and fresh fruit and vegetables three times a week from Madang to the Basamuk site.

“We can carry 8 tonne of food a trip and is fitted with 4×750L chest freezers and a generator.” Said Allan. “Prior to having The Waria, the frozen food we took over had almost thawed out by the time we arrived on site 3 hours later, so having the right food storage on the boat has helped us overcome this major obstacle.” He continued.

Whilst NCS Waria solved the supply logistics requirements, a boat was still needed to transport staff to site. NCS purchased a second boat, The Half Moon is a 19 foot Stinger powered by 50HP outboard motor.

The Half Moon has made life much easier and safer for our hard working crew, who are happy that NCS now has a “navy” in operation.

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