--- title: "Private 5G at a container port | Nexus Observatory" description: "Small cells on the yard lighting masts and a sector site on the operations building serve remote-controlled cranes and trucks among steel container stacks." url: https://observatory.global/environments/networks/private5g-port/ publisher: Nexus Observatory Inc. updated: 2026-10-29 --- Private 5G at a container port. A container terminal with a private network: a sector site on the operations building and cells on the yard lighting masts. Layers Scenario A container terminal with a private network: a sector site on the operations building and cells on the yard lighting masts. 01/06 500 MHz 1 GHz 2 GHz 5 GHz 10 GHz 20 GHz 40 GHz n78 3.5 GHz: 3.30–3.80 GHz · λ 84.4 mm · Main 5G capacity layer, massive MIMO · 3GPP TS 38.101-1 Network scenes # Private 5G at a container port Small cells on the yard lighting masts and a sector site on the operations building serve remote-controlled cranes and trucks among steel container stacks. [Radio access in a city centre](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/ran-city/) [Open RAN in a suburb](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/oran-suburb/) [AI-RAN at a stadium](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/ai-ran-stadium/) [Private 5G in an open-pit mine](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/private5g-mine/) [Private 5G at a container port](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/private5g-port/) [LoRaWAN across a farm and village](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/iot-farm/) [IoT in the city: a street-light mesh and LoRaWAN](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/iot-city/) [Industrial IoT in a process plant](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/iot-plant/) [Satellite direct to device in a mountain valley](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/ntn-d2d/) [Microwave backhaul across a river valley](https://observatory.global/environments/networks/backhaul-fresnel/) The place: [Container terminal](https://observatory.global/environments/container-terminal/) ## In this scene **Sector site on the operations building**: Two sectors from the operations building cover the berth and the yard from above the stacks. (3GPP TS 38.104) Scene input: 68 dBm EIRP per sector **Small cell on a 35 m lighting mast**: Yard lighting masts already have power and height: a small cell on each sees down the aisles between the stacks, on its own 3.9 GHz carrier. (3GPP TS 38.104 (medium range BS), 3GPP TR 38.901 UMi) **Mast cell**: **Mast cell**: **Mast cell**: **Remote-controlled quay crane**: Cameras and controls of a ship-to-shore crane, operated from the control room over the private network. (3GPP TS 22.104 (cyber-physical control)) **Private core and edge compute**: The core and the crane control applications run beside the operations building, so the control loop never leaves the terminal. (3GPP TS 23.501 §5.30 (SNPN), 3GPP TS 23.548 (edge)) ## Links and interfaces **Crane uplink**: Several video streams up, control commands down; the latency budget is set by the control loop. ## Computed for this scenario **Outdoor area at SINR ≥ 10 dB**: 29 % **Median SINR**: 2.5 dB **Shannon bound at median, 100 MHz**: 148 Mbit/s **Cell edge (5th percentile)**: -2.3 dB · 67 Mbit/s **SSB beams per burst (TS 38.213)**: 8 **User beams steered**: 4 **Array gain, 64 elements**: 18.1 dB **Beamwidth, azimuth**: 12.8° **Fibre to the edge**: 948 m · 4.6 µs one way **Fibre**: 482 m · 2.4 µs one way ## Scenarios **Normal**: Sector site and four mast cells on air. **Stacks six high**: Every block is stacked six high: the aisles become street canyons and the stacks shadow the sector site. **Mast cell down**: One mast cell is off for lamp maintenance; its aisles fall back to the neighbours. ## Tour transcript 1. A container terminal with a private network: a sector site on the operations building and cells on the yard lighting masts. 2. A small cell on a 35 m lighting mast sees down the aisles between the stacks. 3. Quay cranes are driven remotely: video up, control down, over the private network. 4. Stack every block six high and the aisles become canyons: the map shows the shadows. 5. One mast cell off for lamp maintenance: its aisles fall back to the neighbours. 6. The private core and the crane applications run beside the operations building. ## How the numbers are computed Coverage at 1.5 m above the yard with 3GPP TR 38.901 UMi (mast cells, on their own 3.9 GHz carrier) and UMa (sector site, 3.5 GHz) path loss; container stacks and ships are drawn solids, and line of sight is tested against them. 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