Vlissingen-Oost, Netherlands 20 October 2012
Built in 1968 at the shipyard of Verolme, Heusden with yard number 759 for service in inland waters. Accommodation for four men. Dimensions 100 (over all) x 27,4 (extreme) x 2,50 (normal)-5,71 (maximum) and a height of 41,00 (unloaded) metres. Equipment no. 260059. Two cranes, one of 13 and one 15 ton. Construction weight 2,000 tons. Loading capacity 4.877 tons. Property of Boskalis, Nederland. Originally a desilting installation. For this purpose she was fitted out with twelve funnel-shaped bunkers placed on twelve portals. She was catamaran shaped with two pontoons each with the dimensions 100,00 x 7,20 and a height of 27,00 metres. The Dutch newspaper De Waarheid dated 7 January 1969 reported that she was used in IJmuiden for making sea sand suitable for the increment of construction sites and in this manner adding to expansion drift of the town Amsterdam. Despite her huge size was just one operator needed in the desalination process. Between the two pontoons was a hopper barge for the desalinated sand. The salt sand was pressed through the funnel shaped bunkers and to which a small amount of fresh water was added. The result was that the salt water was divided from the sand. The desalinated sand settled in a funnel and from there collected into the hopper barge. Her processing capacity was 1.500-2.000 cubic metres desalinated sand. The sea sand was transported via trailing suction hopper dredgers who collected it on a location in the North Sea on a distance of 20 kilometres off Zandvoort to a bunker harbour near the Forteiland in the outer harbour of Ijmuiden. Via pipes was the sea sand pressed towards the Aquila. Next step was transporting the loaded barges with pusher tugs to Amsterdam port area. The project was to be ended in 1978. Later rebuilt as a crane pontoon with two cranes named Roerdomp and Albatros for unloading phosphate in Flushing. In 2005 was by the municipality of Flushing a permission supplied for a phosphate unloading facility in the Sloehaven together with two anchored pontoons De Dintel and De Mark.
