Together with their principals, the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Maritime Office of Szczecin, the joint venture partners hosted several dignitaries and partners for a site visit. Apart from diplomatic participation, Poland’s Secretaries of State Marek Gróbarczyk (Maritime and Water Affairs), Małgorzata Golińska (Nature & Wildlife) and Undersecretary of State Grzegorz Witkowski (Maritime Economy) honored the event with their presence and inaugural speeches.

The project is truly unique in several ways:

• The two main contractors Van Oord and DEME are often fierce rivals in obtaining assignments to carry out large-scale maritime projects. For this mammoth project the two competitors joined hands.
• The project also included construction, with dredged material, of two artificial island, one of which was immediately “seized” as a breeding place for a diverse range of birds, including some endangered species.
• Every tree that had to be cut for the project was replaced by a newly planted tree. In total 9.000 trees and bushes were planted in and around the project location.
• Other mind-boggling statistics: 24 x Poland’s national stadium (1 mln m3) was dredged, 2,5 mln manhours were performed, >350 Ha of land added to Polish territory, 2.000 people and 15 nationalities were employed (no accidents), 15.000 COVID-tests had to be carried out, 10 dredging units were deployed and the project costs amounted to EUR 340 mln.
• The joint venture worked as much as possible with local parties, non-dredging works were executed by Polish partners.

Celebration completion of the works on the Świnoujście-Szczecin Fairway