Thunder Bay (Port)

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First Ocean-going ship loads up on Canadian wheat at Thunder Bay

The shipping season’s first ocean-going vessel has made it to Thunder Bay. On Wednesday Capt. Volodymyr Ovdiyeno was honoured at a special top-hat ceremony aboard the Cyprus-regsistered MV Tundra, which will leave the port 15,000 tonnes heavier carrying a cargo of western Canadian wheat. “My first time here was about 12 years ago,” Ovdiyeno said Thursday afternoon at Richardson’s main elevator on the city’s north side, adding it was pretty exciting to take part in the top-hat ceremony, similar to one held last week in Toronto, where the Tundra was also first. His ship arrived in Toronto and unloaded a cargo hull full of Brazilian sugar. The captain said he plans to stop in Hamilton for another load of cargo before taking the wheat to its final destination in Puerto Rico. Port Authority president Tim Heaney said it’s always a good sign when the first salty arrives in Thunder Bay. http://www.tbnewswatch.com/News/370115/Ocean-going_ship_loads_up_on_Canadian_wheat

Eastern ice latest obstacle to clearing Canada grain backlog

Thick ice on Eastern Canada waterways will hamper efforts to clear a massive crop backlog, with Port of Thunder Bay, Ontario, likely to open at least a week later than usual this spring, its chief executive said. Ice in the port's harbor on Lake Superior is about four feet (1.2 meters) thick, one foot thicker than usual, and it also covers key stretches of shipping routes to the Atlantic Ocean, Port of Thunder Bay CEO Tim Heney said in an interview. Heney said he was optimistic that the port will open during the first week of April after a brutally cold Canadian winter, about a week behind the usual March 25 opening. That's "quite late for us," Heney said from his office in Thunder Bay, a city in northwestern Ontario of more than 100,000 people. "It's going to be a challenge." The port had its latest opening ever, April 12, in 1994 and 1982.