Aertssen – The orbital highway project in Qatar

The Aertssen Group consists of three large divisions: construction & intra, cranes and transport. One of the projects Aertssen is working on in Qatar is the new orbital highway project. This expressway connects the industrial area of Ras Laffan with the new Hamad port area. The new ring road is approximately 200 kilometres long and has 14 traffic lanes, 4 of which are separate and for freight traffic only.

Qatar invests in the infrastructure

During recent years Qatar has shown strong industrial and economic growth. This growth is accompanied by impressive investment in the infrastructure. For Aertssen Transport the Orbital Highway Project is a first. Sam Aertssen, Managing Director of Aertssen Transport: “Our drivers will transport no less than 2,168 concrete bridge sections from the production site to the location where they are to be installed. The heaviest bridge section weighs 92 tonnes. Once they reach their destination, the crane division takes over. The thousands of bridge components that are needed for the construction of 22 interchanges are put in place with crawler cranes. Spread across the project AMS has six Hitachi SCX2800-2 crawler cranes in operation and a few smaller cranes. The smaller cranes will provide additional support during the later stages of the project.”

Sam Aertssen: “We have been active in the Middle East for about ten years already and at the beginning of 2016 we also started with abnormal transport. At the moment we have eight combinations running. The work is so extensive that our vehicles are often in use for most of the day and night. The 7-axle semi low-loader of Nooteboom has already proved itself to be up to the job. With this Nooteboom semi-trailer we transport concrete bridge sections as well as machinery, steel structures, ballast for our cranes and crane bodies.