U.S. Navy expeditionary sea base USS Hershel “Woody” Williams is in West Africa where it is participating in maritime security training alongside Nigerian and Ghanaian maritime security authorities. The ship is scheduled to participate in a three-day sea training exercise with Nigerian offshore patrol vessels and members of Ghana’s Special Boat Squadron as part of efforts to contain the growing menace of piracy in the Gulf of Guinea. USS Hershel “Woody” Williams also becomes is the first warship permanently assigned to the U.S. Africa Command area of responsibility.
USS Hershel “Woody” Williams‘ return to the Gulf of Guinea builds upon exercise Obangame Express that continues to demonstrate U.S. commitment to African partnerships and ensures prosperity through maritime security and stability. Both Ghana and Nigeria were among the 32 nations that participated in Obangame Express 2021 that concluded in March and which was the largest multinational maritime exercise in western Africa region that has become the hotspot for piracy.
“Maritime security is not a one nation obligation. It takes cooperative efforts like this to achieve,” said Capt. Chad Graham, Hershel “Woody” Williams’ commanding officer.
The maritime security training exercise is focused on the collective capabilities for countering the trafficking of illegal arms and drugs, human trafficking, illegal migration, piracy and illegal fishing. The U.S. Navy said that it is participating in these ongoing efforts as part of the need to tackle illegal dealings. They consider the Gulf of Guinea’s security crucial to West Africa’s economic development, but note that it requires regional coastal countries to have strong, professional navies, coast guards and law enforcement institutions that can enable maritime trade to flourish.
“The Gulf of Guinea’s size requires a team effort. It takes multiple coastal nations working together for mutual benefit and that’s what we see,” noted Graham.
The Gulf of Guinea continues to be among the most dangerous environment for commercial maritime operations, a development that has ignited calls for international cooperation to address the menace. Last year, 112 seafarers were abducted in 90 incidents along the gulf. In the first five months of this year, 23 piracy-related incidents had already been reported in the region.
Apart from piracy, the region is witnessing rising cases of illegal fishing with reports indicating that West Africa loses roughly 800,000 tons of fish worth over $2 billion in gross revenue annually.
“Ship visits like this one clearly demonstrate the U.S.’s continued dedication to our partners in the Gulf of Guinea as they strive for security of their resources, their economy and their people,” said Claire Pierangelo, U.S. Consul General in Lagos.
The ship, 784 feet long, serves as a mobile sea platform capable of performing large-scale logistics movements, such as the transfer of vehicles and equipment from sea to shore. Homeported at a NATO naval base on the Greek island of Crete, it is designed to reduce the dependency on foreign ports.
After nearly a week of oil leaking for the latest section to be cut free from the Golden Ray, the unified command overseeing the operation reported that they believed they have located the source of the oil and capped it. The leak, which began on July 31 when they began to raise section six has been the most significant oil leak since salvage work began on the wreck of the car carrier in St. Simons Sound.
“Wreck removal personnel capped a venting pipe after it was raised above the waterline during a partial lifting operation of section six of the Golden Ray wreck on August 6,” the St. Simons Sound Incident Unified Command reported in an update statement today. “The submerged vent was very likely the source of the oil discharges during lifting operations which started on July 31.”
The leak had begun after the team completed the cutting for section six and they began to raise the section to prepare it to be moved to the recycling operation. The section is washed to remove sediment and other debris and it was during this operation the that crew discovered the oil. The section was lowered back down but the oily discharge continued to been seen around the vessel and escaping the protection barrier entering the sound. Oiling was observed on beaches and marshland on St. Simons Island and Jekyll Island although no official estimate was given on the amount of oil that escaped.
The command reported that the crews determined that the venting pipe had connected to two tanks that had fuel removed during fuel lightering operations in October 2019. Since securing the vent, pollution observers report minimal amounts of oil around the section.
Forty-eight hours after locating and capping the vent, the VB-10000 began to again raise the section, and this time they did not observe large oil discharges around the section. The section has again been positioned so that the crews can start the weight-shedding effort during which they remove vehicles and any moveable decks from the section as required to reduce its overall weight. The section will be lifted and stowed onto a dry-dock barge once it is safe to do so. After that, one final cut remains to separate the last two sections of the wreck.
Clean up teams working along the beach (St. Simons Sound Incident Response)
The pollution mitigation teams continue to monitor section six and the area for any potential oil discharges and approximately 30 pollution response vessels remain at the wreck site to monitor for and mitigate any oil.
After the oil was detected, additional personnel were brought in both to manage the recovery as well as a cleanup along the coastline. Wildlife experts from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Resources Division and natural resource advisors conducted a survey on August 4 and they reported seeing several birds that had been oiled. Wildlife rehabilitation specialists recovered 20 oiled juvenile Royal terns from Bird Island on August 7 and transported them to a rehabilitation center in South Carolina for treatment. A laughing gull was released near Jekyll Island fishing pier on Sunday after rehabilitation at a wildlife center in South Carolina.
In addition, approximately 80 personnel split into several shoreline clean-up teams are using various clean-up techniques to mitigate oiled shorelines along the southern edge of St. Simons Island and on the northside of Jekyll Island. The teams use a variety of techniques from hand tools and bags to collect oiled sand to sphagnum moss and sorbent pads to treat oiled marsh grasses.
Hong Kong liner OOCL today debuted a landmark new rail-sea service connecting China to the US east coast.
The Cosco subsidiary’s new offering is a combination of the Chang An China-Europe block train service from Xian to Kaliningrad with onward feeder to Bremerhaven, and then with OOCL ocean services from Bremerhaven to various ports on the US east coast.
The service is the first of its kind to be operated by an ocean carrier, connecting China and North America by using the Asia-Europe Land Bridge and the Atlantic Ocean.
“The intention is to provide reliable and timely shipment by seizing the opportunity to avoid the current high levels of traffic seen on routes to the US West Coast and through the Panama Canal,” OOCL stated in an update today.
The first multimodal container service run by OOCL Logistics and OOCL departed Xian on Wednesday.
Prices of dry freight shipping containers have doubled over the past year to reach historic highs but will moderate over the next few years, according to Drewry’s recently published Container Census & Leasing Annual Review and Forecast 2021/22 report.
Dry box newbuild prices rallied strongly in 2020 from the lows of the prior year to reach their highest level since 2011 by the fourth quarter, with a year-on-year gain of 75%. Then by Q2 this year 40ft high cube containers breached the $6,500 threshold, more than doubling over the year, to reach their highest value since Drewry started monitoring container equipment prices back as far as 1998.
“Pricing has been driven by soaring demand for newbuild containers as shipping lines and lessors have been seeking to rebuild fleets in the face of chronic equipment availability due to widening disruption across the container supply chain,” said John Fossey, head of container equipment and leasing research at Drewry. “But also increased input costs, particularly for corten steel and flooring materials have also played a part. We expect dry box prices to peak in the third quarter and to soften thereafter, easing further over subsequent years as trade normalises.”
In sharp contrast, reefer and tank container prices changed little over 2020, but rallied in the first six months of 2021, up 6.5% and 40% year-onyear, respectively, in Q2. Prices of these specialist container types have different cost drivers to dry containers and are expected to continue rising although at a moderate pace over the next few years.
The transformation of A.P. Moller – Maersk under CEO Soren Skou enters a new, important chapter today with the decision to acquire two e-commerce logistics companies, helping the Danish giant build an asset-light business based on e-commerce technology across Europe, US and Asia and further blurring the lines between container carrier and express operator.
On the back of posting all-time record quarterly profits, Maersk announced today the $838m acquisition of Visible Supply Chain Management (Visible SCM), a business-to-consumer (B2C) logistics company focused on B2C parcel delivery and B2C fulfillment services in the US and headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, US. Furthermore, it announced the intention to spend $86m acquiring B2C Europe, a business-to-consumer logistics company focused on B2C parcel delivery services in Europe and based in The Netherlands.
These acquisitions will make a big difference for customers’ ability to sell across multiple channels effectively
“Fast-changing consumer buying patterns and digital platforms are accelerating online consumption, redefining business models across the globe,” Maersk pointed out in a release today. Many Maersk customers are seeing strong e-commerce sales growth as they roll out digital first strategies and are looking for support of their business-to-consumer supply chain growth.
“The acquisitions will provide Maersk with a strong growth platform in the rapidly evolving field of e-commerce, where our investments in digitalisation and integration will create significant synergies and make a big difference for customers’ ability to sell across multiple channels effectively. Furthermore, they will allow us to have a more comprehensive offering towards small and medium sized customers,” said Maersk Ocean & Logistics CEO Vincent Clerc.
Within e-commerce Logistics, Maersk is building an asset-light, global business focused on two core capabilities: B2C fulfilment and B2C delivery.
Visible SCM enables e-commerce businesses to ship and compete with the biggest brand names out there today. Visible SCM uses a geographical network that places fulfillment centers closer to the consumer, with less distance and faster delivery. Maersk’s customers can tap into Visible SCM’s e-commerce network to deliver goods to 75% of the US population within 24 hours and reaching 95% of the US geography within a two-day delivery window.
B2C Europe, meanwhile, is in parcel delivery services for both retailers and brands as well as for logistics operators, with a focus on cross-border deliveries.
As reported earlier this week, American furniture manufacturer MCS Industries has filed a $600,000 lawsuit with the Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) against Cosco and MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company, claiming that they have repeatedly contravened terms of the US Shipping Act. MCS said the carriers had “unjustly and unreasonably” exploited customers, and had colluded to manipulate the market.
Geneva-based MSC, the world’s second largest carrier, issued a press release yesterday to respond publicly to the claim. The carrier said it “is shocked to learn of the accusations made by MCS,” and emphasized that it had “received no formal complaint by MCS Industries in advance of the filing.” About “subsequent accusations made [by MCS] in the media,” MSC said they are “vague and unsubstantiated and are incorrectly targeted at MSC.”
MSC “does not recognise the alleged shortcomings in booking the cargo allocations provided for this shipper. Furthermore, MSC is not illegitimately selling space allotted to MCS Industries under its service contracts to other shippers.”
The carrier also said it “rejects the accusation of collusion between carriers put forward in the complaint.”
Cosco, the other carrier cited by MCS, has yet to respond publicly to the accusations.
Taiwanese feeder boxship operator TS Lines has added to its newbuilding orderbook, having placed an order at Fujian Mawei Shipbuilding for the construction of six 1,100 teu containerships.
The 147.9 m long boxships, designed by Shanghai Ship Design and Research Institute (SDARI), are the latest generation of vessels for China-Japan shipping routes.
No price or delivery date has been revealed for this order.
Last month, LT Lines booked four 7,000 teu ships at Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding and ordered another 1,900 teu boxship at Huangpu Wenchong Shipbuilding after signing up for a quartet in September last year.
The Waterborne Technology Platform has expanded its membership by welcoming its 100th partner – Maritime & Logistics Innovation Denmark (MARLOG).
MARLOG is Denmark’s official cluster organisation for the maritime and logistics sectors, representing 113 companies, knowledge institutions and organizations from the full value chain including shipowners, shipyards, equipment suppliers, ship designers, service companies, ports and logistic companies among others.
By joining Waterborne Technology Platform, MARLOG aims to contribute to the European maritime transition to green technologies and digitalization.
“Joining the Waterborne Technology Platform gives us an opportunity to strengthen the Danish maritime innovation agenda, through European collaboration and partnerships,” CEO of MARLOG, Sverre V. Lenbroch commented.
“In addition, the expansion of our membership shows the commitment of the sector to develop and deploy solutions for societal challenges. Although the sector is often branded as somewhat old- fashioned and not able to move forward, what we experience today is a full commitment of the sector to transform into a sustainable future,” the Chairman of the Waterborne Technology Platform, Henk Prins added.
Recently, the platform welcomed another member, the UK-based environmental consulting company Ricardo.
Danish shipping and logistics giant A.P. Moller – Maersk has continued to deliver strong growth and profitability with profit going up to $3.7 billion in the second quarter of 2021.
Revenue was up almost 60% to $14.2 billion compared to the same quarter last year and EBIT amounted to $4.1 billion, which is up more than five times.
With a net profit of $3.7 billion in the second quarter of 2021, the net result for the first half of 2021 went up to $6.5 billion, the company revealed in its financial report.
“The results benefitted both from the exceptional circumstances in Ocean, where congestions and bottlenecks continued to drive up rates, and from solid progress in executing on our strategic transformation,” Søren Skou, CEO of A.P. Moller – Maersk commented.
“Looking at both the second quarter and the first half, I am pleased with the progress made and the high value generation, with a return on invested capital now at 23.7% for the past 12 months.”
The outlook for global market demand growth for the year has been revised up to 6-8 percent (about one percentage point), still mainly driven by American demand for Chinese goods.
Accordingly, Maersk has raised its profit guidance upwards, it now expects full-year EBITDA in the range of $18-19.5 billion (about $5 billion more than previous guidance of $13-15 billion) and underlying EBIT expected in the range of $14-15.5 billion (previously $9-11 billion).
Taiwanese shipping line TS Lines has placed an order for the construction of six 1,100 TEU boxships at Fujian Mawei Shipbuilding.
As disclosed, the vessels feature Shanghai Ship Design and Research Institute’s (SDARI) design and are the latest generation of vessels for China-Japan shipping routes.
The new generation of 11,00TEUs is further optimized and upgraded to achieve energy saving and environmental protection targets.
The vessels are 147.9 meters long, 23.25 meters wide, and have 13,300 deadweight tons (DWT).
The ships’ price or the delivery dates were not disclosed.
The move follows TS Lines’ announcement made last month, revealing the order of four 7,000 TEU containerships at Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding.
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