The major harbour of
Tuticorin is well known as a pearl diving and fishing centre. Tuticorin, one of the oldest sea ports in the world, was the seaport of the Pandyan kingdom after Korkai and later was taken over by the Portuguese in 1548, captured by the Dutch in 1658, and ceded to the British in 1825. (Courtesy - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition, 2001) (Courtesy - Wikipedia). The lighthouse built in 1842 marked the beginning of the history of Thoothukudi harbour development.
On 11th July 1974, the newly-constructed Thoothukudi port was declared to be the tenth major port in India, second-largest port in Tamil Nadu and third-largest container terminal in India after JN Port (Mumbai) and Chennai. Thoothukudi is an artificial port. This is the third international port in Tamil Nadu and its second all-weather port. Due to its strategic location in the southern peninsula and assured round-the-clock operations, the port has been the nerve centre of economic activity in south Tamil Nadu. The
Sethusamudram Shipping Canal Project, a project to create a shipping channel through the shallow Palk Strait to allow pasage of larger ships, is headquartered at the Port of Thoothukudi. The port currently handles seven per cent of the total container traffic in India and is an important reason for investment in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu.
The port is badly in need of expansion to handle the increase in traffic. The two container berths in the port are of dimension 370m length and 10.9m depth. This limits the port in competing against Colombo port, which has 15m depth. The Tuticorin Port Trust is investing $1 billion for expansion. This will be done in two phases; the first will deepen the harbour to a depth of 12.8m and the second will increase it to 14.5m. In addition to expansion of the outer harbour, proposed upgrades include construction of breakwaters and lengthening the approach channel. The port has been upgraded to handle vessels longer than 245m. The advantages of deploying bigger vessels are that the existing restriction on booking can be eliminated and the transshipment at Colombo port can be reduced. The Tuticorin port has the potential to be an international container transhipment hub given its unique geographical location. Activity at the port has grown at a rate of 17 per cent per year over the last five years. A large portion of the operations in the port has been privatized, including handling at the first container terminal by PSA Sical. A second container terminal has been approved for this port. Tuticorin port is becoming a gateway for
South India to the US, Europe and the Mediterranean following direct sailings to these regions. Of the total exports from the port,
25 per cent were to Europe, 20 per cent to the US, 20 per cent to East Asia including China, 15 per cent to Colombo, 10 per cent to West Asia and the remainder to the Mediterranean.
This port has been chosen to be an undersea cable landing station. The optical fibre cable will run between
Mt Lavinia (Sri Lanka) and Tuticorin (325 km) with an initial bandwidth of 20 gigabits per second, later to be upgraded to 160 gigabits per second. This will promote the IT investment in South India by improved
telecom infrastructure.
The port is also helping increase the tourism in the region. A new ferry has been commenced between Tuticorin and Colombo.
sourcing from w i k i p e d i a
