FORESTRYJOURNAL.CO.UK AUGUST 20 19 71business has been operating, has received a multimillion-
pound investment and the volume of timber required to
service its needs has grown.
Corpach Port lies opposite Fort William, on the junction
of two lochs, Loch Linnhe and Loch Eil. There is a 120 m
quay with a 5 m depth, allowing fairly large-sized vessels
to berth and offload a variety of cargoes. It is also located
at the southern end of the Caledonian Canal with a sea
lock allowing vessels to enter the basin. It handles a wide
range of cargo, with timber being a major component of
the port’s annual landings.
By the summer of 2011, Liam and his business partners
were convinced that the movement of timber by sea was a
viable business model. They were also encouraged by the
fact that a mobile floating pier had been set up on Loch
Etive to facilitate the removal of large volumes of timber.
This timber would require, over a five-year period, ships
for transportation.
Liam said: “At the time we started out, floating pier
technology was coming into use on the west coast of
Scotland, allowing access to forests, which in the past
would not have been possible. Boyd Brothers were at the
forefront of this and we took over the movement of timber
from Glen Etive using their floating pier. Up to 2016, we
Above: Liam
Browning.moved around 100,000 tonnes of timber from there to
Corpach.”
To allow them to do this effectively, GGSC purchased
two 900-tonne-capacity coastal vessels, the MV Burhou
and MV Isis, and ceased the chartering of the MV
Kanutta. One of the first tasks was to convert the MV
Burhou to become a self-discharging and -loading vessel
through the addition of an excavator base and crane.
Liam said this was critical as they planned to operate
in and out of small harbours and piers where larger ships
could not get access. In these locations, it was very likely
that there would not be the shore-based facilities such as
cranes and other equipment to facilitate the loading of the
ships. The goal for Liam then became one of establishing
a business that was aiming to become a key link in the
movement of timber for the forestry industry in the west
coast of Scotland.
Initially, there was not enough work to keep both
ships occupied and the MV Isis was laid up at Corpach.
However, at this time, investment work was being carried
out on piers at Mull and Knoydart, allowing more timber
to be harvested there and extracted via ships. This also
came at a time when there was an increased demand for
roundwood in the marketplace. The GGSC ships were
attractive in that they could carry 650 tonnes of timber,
which could be loaded in a day, shipped overnight, and at
the sawmill the next morning.
“This gave us a real point of difference, as those
harvesting the timber and the end-user sawmill could
schedule production at the levels that were required on a
daily, weekly, monthly basis,” said Liam. “We could and
still can give them a drip feed of timber, if that is what
they require. We set out to get into the nooks and crannies
of smaller harbours and piers that the bigger ships could
not access. In effect, we were looking to create a niche
transportation solution for the timber industry in the west
coast of Scotland.”
Supplying timber to the Iggesund plant at Workington
added to the workload of GGSC and ultimately led it to
chartering CEG Cosmos, which had a 1,000-tonne cargo
capacity. It still supplies timber to Workington on what
Liam describes as the ‘milk run’. This vessel also allowed
larger cargoes of other commodities to be moved by the
company, as and when the timber market demand has
moved up and down.
As well as working with timber companies and others
to ensure the vessels were kept fully occupied during