Onboard forklifts are helping marine transport carrier Nunavut Eastern Arctic Shipping Inc (NEAS) to load cargo and freight on its four ships.

"We own 12 forklifts (with lifting capacities) of 4-16 metric tons," says Georges Tousignant, manager of operations for Iqaluit-based NEAS. The Caterpillar brand is on six of the forklifts, and Kalmar and Linde identities are on the others.

In an early August operation, sealift barges ferried 6,500 cubic metres of scrap metal that was staged on the beach at Iqaluit. Over two days, NEAS utilised four onboard forklifts to unload the barge contents onto the 110-metre MV Aivik, rather than employ the freighter's two 155-ton heavy-lift derricks. The cranes are deemed to be slow and pose operational risks.

The flat-bottom MV Aivik, which has a rear loading hatch with sea-opening capability, delivered the scrap metal from Iqaluit to a port along the Saint Lawrence River. The nearby Quebec City plant of American Iron & Metal Co Inc processed the material and, with proceeds from the sales, covered expenses for the freight haul-out.

For Iqaluit leaders, disposing of the long-accumulated scrap metal brought relief. In 2009, high winds and icy conditions prompted a freighter to leave the vicinity without picking up any of the available metal.

During July in advance of the MV Aivik's arrival, the community's public works department gathered abandoned vehicles and other scrap metal and had the landfill staff compact and crush the materials.

Iqaluit, capital of the Canadian territory of Nunavut, is located on the south coast of Baffin Island. The community was known as Frobisher Bay prior to 1987.

Inuit birthright corporations own a majority of NEAS. The firm serves as an economic link between Canada's Arctic region and other localities and has 40 shipping destinations in Canada, according to Tousignant.