Liebherr has installed Africa's first LPS portal slewing crane at Morocco's Port of Casablanca, deploying a 144-tonne-lifting, rail-mounted LPS 550 to operator Marsa Maroc's bulk handling berth.

The 48-metre-boom unit, driven electrically, will support container, steel, cereal, animal feed, mineral and vehicle flows at Morocco's principal commercial gateway. Liebherr confirmed the order links directly to Marsa Maroc's Marsa 2030 development programme.

"The crane provides the flexibility to serve a broad range of vessel classes," Liebherr said. "Its rail-mounted portal design delivers substantial lifting capability while preserving valuable quay space. Advanced drive systems enable accurate crane movements and consistent handling performance throughout intensive operating cycles."

What does the crane change at Casablanca?

The rail-mounted portal configuration lets the unit span the quay without consuming apron space already used by mobile harbour cranes and ship-to-shore gantries. The 48-metre outreach covers Panamax and larger bulk carriers. The 144-tonne hook handles heavy-lift project cargoes alongside routine bulk grabs.

For Marsa Maroc, the addition reduces double-handling and accelerates vessel turnaround at berths where berth window is tight.

How big is Casablanca's cargo base?

The port covers more than 450 hectares with over 8 kilometres of quays and capacity to berth up to 40 vessels simultaneously. In 2025, Marsa Maroc moved more than 19 million tonnes of cargo and nearly 1.1 million TEU through its Casablanca operations.

Marsa Maroc's wider network spans 35 terminals across 21 Moroccan ports, handling roughly 67 million tonnes annually.

What does this mean for shippers and forwarders?

Shorter crane cycle times and the ability to handle diverse cargoes on a single berth should compress vessel stay time at Casablanca, where container, dry-bulk and breakbulk traffic compete for the same quay slots. For project cargo clients shipping steel, minerals or oversize units, the 144-tonne hook removes the need to divert to Tangier-Mediterranean or other Maghreb hubs for heavy lifts. Dry-bulk shippers moving cereals and feed gain redundancy to existing mobile fleet capacity.

How does this fit the broader fleet plan?

The Casablanca delivery follows three LHM 550 mobile harbour cranes that Liebherr shipped to Marsa Maroc in 2024. Additional Liebherr units are scheduled for the operator's Nador and Tangier terminals, extending the rail-mounted and mobile fleet across Morocco's Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts.

The pipeline points to a coordinated capacity build aligned with Marsa 2030, which targets containerised throughput growth and operational modernisation across the operator's national portfolio. Liebherr's own position in the deal strengthens as African ports accelerate mechanisation to handle larger Panamax and Post-Panamax bulk carriers. The Casablanca installation becomes a regional reference for other Mediterranean and West African terminals evaluating portal crane solutions.

For Marsa Maroc, the deployment of the first LPS in Africa locks in operational know-how at its flagship hub ahead of further capacity additions at secondary ports. Forward-looking shippers routing through Morocco should expect berth availability to tighten during commissioning windows, with steady-state gains in lifting throughput once the new crane enters full rotation.