Saudi Aramco raises concerns over Project Progress delays according to base line (Rev.1) schedule. The recorded progress slippage for Procurement is 60.85 % and for Construction 38.49% as of July 04, 2014. The following details show the events and associated delays.
1.	Manpower mobilization was rescheduled to complete on September 26, 2013. Original date as per contract was within 30 days from the award of contract i.e. February 25, 2013. IC completed mobilization of offices and precast plant much later in April 2014 causing delays to subsequent activities and is still struggling with lack of skilled manpower and subcontractors.
2.	Complete PO Placement for all bulk materials was scheduled on October 31, 2013, but till date the Contractor is not able to complete the Material submittal and Approval process. 
3.	PO Placement of many long lead items is still pending. The outstanding items have been highlighted by SAPMT regularly, but actions by IC have been much slower causing enormous slippages.
4.	All Materials were to be delivered to Work Site by June 20, 2014; but as of date, the contactor is not in a position to deliver a single long lead item on site.
5.	Fence Installation at Zone B (7+000 to 5+500) was scheduled to complete on May 28, 2014 but it was delayed by 40.88%. Zone C (7+100 to 8+800) was scheduled to complete on July 03, 2014 but it was delayed by 84.22%. Also, the overall Progress slippage on Fence installation is hard to recover since it has reached 24.18%.
6.	Construction of Culvert was scheduled to commence on January 22, 2014 and should have been completed 51% by now - to date contractor is not in a position to start the work.
7.	KAM Access road construction was scheduled to complete on March 19, 2014. SAPMT agreed to complete latest by July 31, 2014. The current progress trend shows that it is impossible to complete the task as extended.
8.	Construction of Maintenance road and Patrol road was delayed on Zone A, B and C as well. Overall Road construction progress has slipped by 50.33% as of to-date.
9.	Complete Relocation of existing fence and security system at KAM access road was scheduled on June 20, 2014 whereas the activity is yet to be completed and is contributing 45% to progress slippage.
10.	Construction of Buildings was scheduled to commence on November 21, 2013 whereas at the moment there is hardly any work being done on the buildings (Plan is 40.8% whereas Actual is 5.8%). 
11.	Installation of Package Substations was scheduled to commence on May 06, 2014 and IC has just recently completed the material approval process.
12.	Installation of UPS System was scheduled to commence on August 04, 2014, but PO was placed only on April 22, 2014 and also Building works are yet to be commenced.
13.	MV Cable laying was schedule to commence on August 04 2014, but there is no positive sign from contractor to start the activity as scheduled. PO for MV cable was placed only on April 22, 2014.
14.	Installation of Lighting Pole foundation at Zone A & B should have been completed at this moment (Scheduled completion date was June 16, 2014). But till date the contractor has not prepared for pre casting of foundations. Also Lighting Poles installation should have been commenced on June 17, 2014 whereas PO was placed only on April 22, 2014, and materials have not arrived yet.
15.	Communication duct bank works are delayed by 64.20% at all the stations.
16.	Installation of Vessel Barriers and Sonar System was schedule to commence on May 19, 2014. Also, commencement of Boat Automatic Identification system and Radar System installation was scheduled on June 21, 2014 and June 22, 2014 respectively, but these items have still not been delivered to site. Similarly contractor has completely delayed the installation of Onshore Security Systems such as Intrusion detection and assessment system, Security Access Control System, Dropped arm crash barrier, all closed circuit system and cargo screening system. It is important to note that, the contractor was not in a position to produce a copy of PO’s for most of the Items mentioned above. Construction Progress slippage of Security systems has reached to 39.40% as of July 04, 2014.
17.	The trend curve for monthly progress shows the significant progress made by the contractor during the Month of June 14 which was accomplished due to the commencement for Fence Erection. The progress is likely to be disturbed again as IC and its subcontractors have fallen behind in the fabrication and erection of precast wall, since then.
 

18.	Contractor has proposed a revision in schedule which is still under review by SAPMT but the Procurement Progress slippage even in the proposed schedule (Rev.2) has reached to 12.45%. 
IC is urged to provide concrete steps to meet the project milestones and schedule deadlines.

Should you have any questions, please contact Sohail Moughal, Project Engineer at Tel No. +966 12 422-4570.
