APL launches premium Shanghai-LA service to help airfreight shippers

    Singapore's APL, now unit of French shipping giant CMA CGM, is to target space-constrained airfreight shippers on the busy China-US route with its 11-day trans-Pacific ocean freight service between Shanghai and Los Angeles that will be launched in June.

    The premium service is an extension of the Eagle suite of time-definite and guaranteed offerings by the carrier, IHS Media reported quoting APL's chief executive officer Nicolas Sartini.

    "It will not be big ships. We will carry 2,000 TEU on this premium service and address a specific type of customer that wants speed to market and to get his goods on the shelf," Mr Sartini said on the sidelines of the TPM 2018 conference.

    He said the premium service that was launched in 2017 has proved to be popular with shippers of apparel, garments and electronics, commodities that would often be transported by as air freight.

    Following the heavily trafficked November-December peak season, there is concern that finding airfreight space will be an area of continuing frustration for shippers in 2018. In 2017, rising volume through most of the year placed available capacity under pressure, creating lengthy delays and pushing air cargo rates up to unprecedented levels.

    "So we came up with the super fast service to LA," Mr Sartini said. "We wanted cargo to be available the following morning. Ships arrive on Tuesday morning and spend the day discharging the containers. Then at 6pm the containers are taken to the depot outside the port so the customer does not need to pay the PierPass charge, and from 6am the container is on the chassis and ready to be picked up."

    "By doing that, the cargo can be ready on Wednesday afternoon, which is a total of 12 days. With airfreight, the flight is only one day but it takes four to five days to bring the cargo to the airport and then pick it up from the airport on the other side. So we have 5-days by air, and 12-days by sea. Our fare is higher than the other port pairs on the trans-Pacific, but it is much lower than air freight."

    While the premium service is being positioned to compete with Shanghai-Los Angeles air freight, Mr Sartini said not all the cargo on the ship would be poached from air.

    "Some will come from ocean freight because there are customers that are really concerned about speed to market and are ready to pay a premium for this type of service. Other cargo will come from customers that are supporting us today and would like an even faster solution," he said.

Containers fall from Maersk ship off North Carolina in heavy seas

    More than seventy containers fell off a Maersk vessel off the coast of North Carolina, prompting the US Coast Guard (USCG) to issue a warning to mariners that they should navigate the area with caution.

    The containers, numbering between 70 and 73, came off the 2016-built Maersk Shanghai last Saturday night while the ship was about 20 miles from Oregon Inlet, North Carolina. The ship was en route from Norfolk, Virginia to Charleston, South Carolina.

    The 10,081 TEU vessel alerted Sector North Carolina's command centre after the containers were lost in high winds and heavy seas, according to Singapore's Splash 247.

    America's east coast has been experiencing violent winds, approaching hurricane force, rain and flooding over the past weekend.

MOL introduces cutting-edge stowage planning for car carriers

    Japanese shipping giant Mitsui OSK Lines (MOL) has introduced an upgraded stowage planning system for car carriers called "MOL-CAPS", the company announced.

    MOL-CAPS generates a voyage-by-voyage stowage plan that determines where to stow specific vehicles by considering different factors, such as the onboard structure, the type of vehicles and ports of call.

    The company introduced MOL-CAPS in 1999, and will adopt this version for the next-generation car carriers, the FLEXIE series, which will be delivered starting in March 2018.

    The new version allows optimal stowage, with the optimum use of the FLEXIE series, its new deck structure, which offers a greater range of liftable deck heights, providing more flexibility compared to car carriers now in service.

    The new version has a high-speed processing planning function based on know-how of car carrier stowage, which MOL has accumulated over 50 years.

(Source:HKSG-GROUP)

Asia Pacific Shipping