During the National Day holiday, numerous ports kept operating and constructing without pause, as ports were bustling and foreign trade vitality surged powerfully.

On October 7, at the Dalian Container Terminal in Liaoning, docked vessels were carrying out loading and unloading operations.

Where rivers meet the sea, port operations are busy.

During the National Day holiday, giant vessels came and went at various ports, with loading and unloading in full swing, driving domestic and foreign trade goods to move in and out quickly.

On the coast of the East China Sea, four giant container ships lined up in a row, fully automated bridge cranes lifted and lowered with precision, and more than a hundred automated guided vehicles shuttled silently.

In the first three days of the National Day holiday, the Phase IV automated terminal at Yangshan Deep Water Port of the Shanghai International Shipping Center handled a cumulative total of more than 79,000 TEUs, an increase of 18.7% compared with the same period last year; it was expected to handle more than 180,000 TEUs over the seven-day holiday.

"The entire process of ship berthing and departure, cargo loading and unloading, and route connections is intelligently scheduled, maximizing the release of the port area's throughput efficiency," introduced Huang Hua, chief remote operator of Shangdong Branch of SIPG.

As an important hub connecting the domestic and international dual circulation, ports can be described as a "barometer" of economic development.

In the first eight months of this year, China's total import and export value of goods trade increased by 17.6% year on year; port cargo throughput reached 12.06 billion tons, of which foreign trade throughput increased by 2.8% year on year.

By the Beibu Gulf, freight trains shuttled; in the Qinzhou Port area, cargo ships formed lines... During the National Day holiday, the automated container terminal at Qinzhou Port in Guangxi maintained 24-hour continuous operations, with throughput from October 1 to 7 expected to reach 45,000 TEUs.

On September 16, the Pinglu Canal officially opened to navigation, and the "circle of friends" in this sea area expanded accordingly: iron ore and auto parts from Yunnan and Guizhou were sent south to ASEAN through rail-water intermodal transport; coal and bauxite from Guinea and Laos traveled north along the canal into the southwestern hinterland.

"The voyage to the sea has been greatly shortened. Recently, many new customers have been added from Guangxi's Guigang, Nanning, Baise, as well as Yunnan, Guizhou, and Sichuan," said Zhang Minghe, deputy manager of the Operations Department of Honggang Terminal Co., Ltd. of Guangxi Qinzhou Bonded Port Area.

Turning to the northeast, on the afternoon of October 7, the Ocean Alliance Europe route vessel "Oriental Sweden" steadily docked at the Dalian Container Terminal in Liaoning, with seven loading and unloading lines operating simultaneously.

Dalian Container Terminal Co., Ltd. handles more than 98% of the foreign trade container transport volume in Northeast China, and this year it opened five new foreign trade routes.

"Within a docking time of less than 20 hours, we need to complete the loading and unloading of nearly 4,900 TEUs," introduced Qiu Li, duty manager of the Operations Department of Dalian Container Terminal Co., Ltd. During the National Day holiday, the container terminal's workload remained at a high level, with total loading and unloading volume expected to increase by about 20% year on year. "There is grain bound for southern provinces, as well as precision instruments, complete vehicles, and equipment parts bound for Europe."

During the National Day holiday, port upgrades did not stop.

At Shanghai Port's third automated terminal, construction of the Xiaoyangshan North Operating Area project was in full swing, and all five automated quay cranes were in place.

Qin Tao, deputy commander of the engineering command headquarters of SIPG, introduced that this brand-new automated terminal will iteratively upgrade the new-generation smart operation and management system for automated terminals independently developed by SIPG.

At the Qinzhou Port automated container terminal, five 5,000-ton-class river-sea intermodal automated container berths were under simultaneous construction, with large tunneling machinery roaring without pause.

Before long, river vessels from the Pinglu Canal will be able to berth alongside sea vessels, and cargo will achieve "water-to-water transfer and direct unloading and direct loading" through gantry cranes, belt conveyors, floating cranes, and other equipment, reducing the steps of landing and warehousing and greatly increasing efficiency.

China has already built and put into operation 60 automated terminals nationwide, including 30 automated container terminals, accounting for 27% of the global total; the fastest single-machine operating efficiency of the automated terminals at Shanghai Port and Shandong Qingdao Port exceeds 60 natural containers per hour, and the average time in port for international container vessels at major coastal ports is 1.7 days.