BOOK REVIEW | Heavy Lift & Project Cargo Operations – An Introduction

This massive, 480 A4 pages tome nearly injured my postman. It is quite a work as you would expect from Mike Wall, a Thailand- and Hong Kong-based Englishman who has become the oracle of marine surveying. Also, as you would expect, it is comprehensive, detailed, and practically all-encompassing – as well as being appropriately heavy.

As Mike explains, heavy lift and project cargo shipping operations are very complex and incredibly exacting activities. Just loading and unloading are complicated enough. Ensuring the ships involved are stable and safe requires painstakingly detailed calculations.

Just how to make those calculations and how to conduct those complex operations is explained in considerable and valuable detail in this excellent book. His fine photographs and first-rate drawings reflect a fifty-year career conducting those operations.

Mike has a real talent for explaining very complicated operations simply and clearly. That’s what makes his books so valuable to real working practitioners. For many decades to come, this excellent – if heavy – book will remain the “Bible” of heavy lift and project cargo operations.

Author: Mike Wall

Available from the author at: [email protected]


Neil Baird

Co-founder and former Editor-in-Chief of Baird Maritime and Work Boat World magazine, Neil has travelled the length and breadth of this planet in over 40 years in the business. He knows the global work boat industry better than anyone.