Traditional Graving and Floating docks, are expensive and require more space, rendering them economically unsuitable for small-town. Small to medium-sized vessels use the congested Durban harbour which is costly because of long queues for docking, maintenance, repair, and inspection. The paper presents a of a hydro-mechanical dry-docking system for a small town using a case study in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The design employed a quantitative approach to find the dock size and the dewatering system using hydraulic gates. The hydrostatic loads, dewatering times, and power consumption were determined whilst the monthly operational and sequencing logistics will be determined when the small harbour start to operate. The system, can dewater a 19,800 m³ basin in  5 hours using a 368 kW centrifugal pumps. The dock uses the Digital Twins (DT) for predictive maintenance and AI-driven operational optimization, to enhance long-term efficiency and sustainability. The dry dock would offer a practical, cost-effective systems suitable for sustainable maritime operations in developing coastal regions.

Keywords

Hydro dry dock; pumping system, hydraulic gate system, dry docking feasibility, small harbour infrastructure.