Puerto Miranda is an oil port situated on the east side of Lake Maracaibo

Lake Maracaibo

Lake Maracaibo is a large brackish bay in Venezuela at . It is connected to the Gulf of Venezuela by Tablazo Strait at the northern end, and fed by numerous rivers, the largest being the Catatumbo. It is commonly considered a lake rather than a bay or lagoon, and at 13,210 km² it would be the...

 in Venezuela

Venezuela

Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...

 opposite the city of Maracaibo

Maracaibo

Maracaibo is a city and municipality located in northwestern Venezuela off the western coast of the Lake Maracaibo. It is the second-largest city in the country after the national capital Caracas and the capital of Zulia state...

 and is operated by the Venezuelan State Oil Company (PDVSA PETROLEO, S.A.)

Petróleos de Venezuela S.A.

Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. is the Venezuelan state-owned petroleum company. It has activities in exploration, production, refining and exporting oil, as well as exploration and production of natural gas...

  It is the largest crude oil export port in South America.

History

Shell

Royal Dutch Shell

Royal Dutch Shell plc , commonly known as Shell, is a global oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the fifth-largest company in the world according to a composite measure by Forbes magazine and one of the six...

, together with the Esso

Esso

Esso is an international trade name for ExxonMobil and its related companies. Pronounced , it is derived from the initials of the pre-1911 Standard Oil, and as such became the focus of much litigation and regulatory restriction in the United States. In 1972, it was largely replaced in the U.S. by...

 and Gulf subsidiaries Creole and Mene Grande, decided to construct a deepwater port inside Lake Maracaibo from which to export their crude oils, together with a tank farm

Oil depot

An oil depot is an industrial facility for the storage of oil and/or petrochemical products and from which these products are usually transported to end users or further storage facilities...

 to store crude oils that were later sent to the refineries in Amuay

Amuay

Amuay is a fishing town located in the Paraguana Peninsula, in Falcón state, Venezuela. It is a natural bay, also has a fishing port and the bigger part of the Paraguana Refinery Complex is located there....

 and Cardon on the Paraguaná peninsula

Paraguaná Peninsula

The Paraguaná Peninsula is a peninsula in Venezuela, situated in the north of Falcón State. The island of Aruba lies 27 km to the north. Bonaire and Curaçao are slightly further away. The Paraguaná Peninsula is connected to the rest of the state by a natural isthmus of Médanos. The Peninsula...

.
Construction of the port started at the end of the 1950s and was completed in 1961.

Facilities

Puerto Miranda has two jetties, each long enough to take two tankers, so that four tankers can be serviced at one time.
Jetty No. 2 (North) provides two berths, Berth No. 1 and No. 2; Jetty No. 3 (South) provides Berths No. 5 and 6.
All cargo is loaded through 12 inches (304.8 mm) chiksans at a maximum rate of about 5,500 Tonne

Tonne

The tonne, known as the metric ton in the US , often put pleonastically as "metric tonne" to avoid confusion with ton, is a metric system unit of mass equal to 1000 kilograms. The tonne is not an International System of Units unit, but is accepted for use with the SI...

s per hour.
Products supplied are

• Fuel Oil No. 2 and No. 6

and the following crude oils:

• Laguna
• Tia Juana Heavy
• Bachaquero
• Lagunillas
• Cabimas
• Menemota
• Lagomar
• Lagocinco
• Lagotreco

For a list of crude oil types see the List of crude oil products

Berth Restrictions

Berth	DRAFT Draft (hull) The draft of a ship's hull is the vertical distance between the waterline and the bottom of the hull , with the thickness of the hull included; in the case of not being included the draft outline would be obtained...	LOA	BEAM Beam (nautical) The beam of a ship is its width at the widest point. Generally speaking, the wider the beam of a ship , the more initial stability it has, at expense of reserve stability in the event of a capsize, where more energy is required to right the vessel from its inverted position...	DISPLACEMENT Displacement (ship) A ship's displacement is its weight at any given time, generally expressed in metric tons or long tons. The term is often used to mean the ship's weight when it is loaded to its maximum capacity. A number of synonymous terms exist for this maximum weight, such as loaded displacement, full load...	Summer DWT Deadweight tonnage Deadweight tonnage is a measure of how much weight a ship is carrying or can safely carry. It is the sum of the weights of cargo, fuel, fresh water, ballast water, provisions, passengers, and crew...
1	12.04 m	277.4 m	30.48 m	90,000 T	115,000 T
2	11.43 m	277.4 m	30.48 m	90,000 T	115,000 T
5	12.04 m	277.4 m	41.15 m	90,000 T	115,000 T
6	11.43 m	277.4 m	41.15 m	90,000 T	115,000 T

The maximum sailing draft for navigating the main lake channel is 11.53 metres.