Air freight handling for cut flowers and fresh produce

Handling cut flowers at 50°C

The Dubai Flower Centre is the world's first airfreight terminal specializing in the handling of cut flowers. The geographical location is ideal for a flower transshipment center. After all, Dubai lies at the intersection of the most important growing and buying countries in Asia, Africa and Europe. However, summer temperatures of up to 50°C require a great deal of technical effort in order to meet the requirements of the sensitive goods.

The aluminum containers (ULDs) from the cargo plane are transported to the terminal with cooled dollies and reach the interior of the 10,000 m² building complex, which is cooled to between 2 and 12°C, via air locks. At the heart of the facility is the 20m-high high-bay warehouse. 2 storage and retrieval machines store the ULDs, which weigh up to 6.8 tons, in the compartments.

The ULDs are transported via automatic conveyor lines to one of 21 work stations where the ULDs are picked. All movements and stocks are coordinated by the Inventory Control System

Scope of services Unitechnik

Control technology:

• 12 x Simatic S7-400
• Profibus DP

Camera surveillance system (CCTV):

• 30 cameras
• 4 monitors

Inventory Control System:

• Cluster server with 10 computer terminals
• Temperature monitoring
• Product management (with restrictions)
• Coupling with CMS host

Switchgear construction
Assembly
Training
Production support

Overall responsibility:
ICM Airport Technics GmbH (Unitechnik Group)

• Entire freight terminal is cooled to 2 - 12°C
  
• Automated ULD warehouse with:
  2 stacker cranes (ETV)
  258 storage locations (20ft ULDs)
  4-fold deep storage
  3 different temperature zones
  4 automatic transfer cars
  2 vacuum cooling compartments
  21 work stations
  2 X-ray stations
  15 airlocks
  10 hermetically sealed loading bays
  
• 180,000 tons of freight per year