In the municipality of Iglesias, in the southwest of the island of Sardinia, and near the town of Nebida, lies one of the world’s most remarkable feats of engineering: a seaport literally hanging from a cliff.
It’s called Porto Flavia and was built between 1923 and 1924 to facilitate the export of the region’s rich mining output, including coal, sulfur, barium, zinc, lead, silver, and other metals.
It was designed by engineer Cesare Vecelli, who proposed an ingenious plan: building a port directly into the cliff face, connected through a system of tunnels to the top of the cliff, in a location where the water depth was sufficient for steamships to dock. He named it after his daughter, Flavia.
He constructed two overlapping tunnels about 600 meters in length, connected by nine large vertical storage bins. The minerals were transported by an electric train and unloaded into the bins through hatches.
Then, compartments would open to drop the desired minerals into the lower tunnel, where a 16-meter conveyor belt transported them to the ships docked at the base of the cliff, a process that took about two days.
Before Porto Flavia was built, workers had to load ships by hand, with baskets, a process that took no less than seven days.
The upper tunnel was excavated starting 37 meters above sea level. For the lower tunnel, workers had to hang from ropes off the cliff and begin drilling at a height of 16 meters, heading in the opposite direction from the upper gallery.
Drilling from the cliff inward had the advantage of allowing them to dump rocks directly into the sea.
Although it wasn’t necessary, the company owner requested that towers and concrete arches be constructed at the seaward end of the tunnels, along with decorative plaques displaying the date and name of the port, resulting in the structure’s unique appearance today.
When Porto Flavia began operations in 1924, it reduced mineral production costs by up to 70 percent.
The owning company, Vieille Montagne, operated the port exclusively, prohibiting its use by other mining companies, until its closure in 1990, when mineral production in the area ceased.
Today, Porto Flavia is under UNESCO protection, and guided tours are available through its tunnels.
This article was first published on our Spanish Edition on September 16, 2019: Porto Flavia, el puerto marítimo colgado de un acantilado
SOURCES
Wikipedia, Porto Flavia
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