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Click to view map Coordinates: | This is the largest and oldest dry dock of its kind in the southern hemisphere (SGM Website). South Africa’s engagement in WW2 had large convoys of Allied military vessels calling at the Cape, many in need of attention or repair, necessitating a dry dock. The new basin of Table Harbour then being excavated, was extended urgently for which the Hollandsche Aannemings Maatschappij (HAM, its South African subsidiary being the Hollandse Aannemings Maatskappy), at the time engaged with the development of the Duncan Docks, was contracted for this as well. The Sturrock Graving Dock (1940-1945), named for the then Minister of Railways and Harbours, Frederick Claud Sturrock, required enormous volumes of concrete for its construction. The HAM mastery of concrete technology had been greatly advanced by the associated Dutch civil engineers, who had already, at that time in the Netherlands, constructed large dry docks at the harbours of Amsterdam and Rotterdam as well as having enlarged the Noordzeekanaal locks for providing access to ocean-going steamers. Its overall docking length is 360m, the length on bottom (dock floor) is 350,4m, the width at entrance top is 45,1m, its maximum width at bottom (dock floor) is 38,4m, the depth is 14m, depth over entrance sill is 13,7m. A docking length of 369,6m can be achieved by placing the caisson in the emergency stop at the entrance. The dock can be divided into two compartments of either 132,5m and 216,1m or 205,7m and 142,9m (Wikimapia). Books that reference Sturrock Graving Dock – Table Bay Harbour
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