The MSC Ariane, which diverted to Japan for repairs, resumed sailing for the Port of Los Angeles on Tuesday.
MSC Mediterranean Shipping Co. said the Ariane “had an engine issue due to bad quality of fuel” on April 2 while en route from Xiamen, China, to LA.
MSC did not say what repairs were done in Wakayama, Japan.
The Ariane now is expected to anchor in California’s San Pedro Bay on April 30, “but due to the congestion in the Los Angeles area,” is not expected to berth until May 10, MSC said in an update Tuesday.
The Ariane, with a carrying capacity of 13,050 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), had been slated to arrive at the Port of LA this Saturday.
Built in 2012, the Ariane is deployed on MSC’s Pearl service, which also includes calls at Vung Tau, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Yantian, China.
Large-volume importers using the Pearl service, according to FreightWaves data, include Adidas, Amazon, Ikea, Levi Strauss, Puma, Williams-Sonoma, Wolverine World Wide and Yokohama Tire.
Arrivals at the ports of LA and Long Beach have been delayed in recent months primarily because of historic congestion in San Pedro Bay. However, there have been a number of high-profile delays caused by at-sea container losses and mechanical problems, including that of the ONE Apus, which lost 1,816 containers overboard while en route to Long Beach on Nov. 30. The Apus turned back for Asia, arriving at the Port of Kobe in Japan on Dec. 8.
According to a customer update from ONE, the Apus was expected to arrive at the Port of Long Beach in mid-April and it reportedly has completed the discharge of surviving cargo and departed Sunday for Oakland, California.
“Preliminary information will be provided to our ONE customers on whether their containers are identified as overboard or not,” the shipping line said in the update.
That information has not been shared with the public. Henry Byers, FreightWaves’ maritime market expert, has said top importers using ONE as their ocean carrier into the Port of Long Beach include Flexport International, MOL Consolidation, Topocean Consolidation, UPS Ocean Freight Services, DHL Global Forwarding, Kuehne + Nagel and C.H. Robinson.
The Maersk Essen’s arrival at the Port of LA was more than six weeks later than scheduled because of the loss of 750 containers in mid-January in the North Pacific.
And the arrival of the Maersk Eureka at the Port of Long Beach was pushed back by about three weeks because of a mechanical problem that occurred at sea on March 12. According to MarineTraffic, the Eureka sailed from Long Beach on Sunday and is en route to Ningbo, China.
MSC Ariane experiences engine problem en route to LA
Maersk Essen loses 750 containers, sails for Mexico
ONE Apus container loss shows need for ‘real-time information’
Click here for more American Shipper/FreightWaves stories by Senior Editor Kim Link-Wills.
