Ship loader is one of the material handling equipments that is used for loading vessels for transportation by sea continuously with coal, iron ore, cement, fertilizers, grain and other bulk materials. Shiploaders are designed to load different sizes of ships that will berth at ports and jetties from where bulk materials are exported.

Ship loader uses the travelling movement and incorporates shuttle type of conveyor and luffing feature to allow movement in three axes so that the ship loader can efficiently load many different sizes of ships. The ship loader also has a chute and rotating spoon arrangement for directing the bulk product into the different areas of a ships hold.

Ship loaders mainly consist of an extendable arm or boom, a belt conveyor and a mobile structure to support the boom. It is usually mounted on rails and sometimes on tyres and can move in order to be able to reach the whole length of the ship. The boom also can move front and back, up and down by separate drives so that it can fill all the corners of the ship holds. There are three types of boom conveyors: Slewing type, fixed type and shuttle type. There is also a type of shiploader equipped with a dustless telescopic loading chute at the head of the boom. The most suitable type is selected among these, depending on the related facilities, handling materials and the working conditions. Booms are adjustable to various combinations of swing, derricking and slewing angles to facilitate a wide range of unloading operations.