YANGMING, “K” LINE ADD POST-PANAMAX SHIPS, CAPACITY TO PACIFIC
YANGMING, “K” LINE ADD POST-PANAMAX SHIPS, CAPACITY TO PACIFIC
Yangming Marine Corp. said that it will phase five new 5,551-TEU post-Panamax vessels in its Pacific Southwest Service (Y-PSW) loop, starting in March, replacing vessels of 3,266 TEUs.
In a related development, Yangming’s partner “K” Line announced changes in the ports of call and the introduction of larger ships for the ASX transpacific service.
The Y-PSW service, operated as part of the COSCO/”K” Line/Yangming alliance and using Yangming vessels, will see its one-way capacity increase by about 70 percent, to 289,000 TEUs a year, shortly before the start of the peak season in the eastbound Pacific trade.
Yangming will also revise the rotation and improve the transit times of the service, by using the new 25-knot vessels.
The Y-PSW service will have a rotation of Yantian (Fri/Sat), Hong Kong (Sun/Sun), Kaohsiung (Mon/Tue), Keelung (Tue/Wed), Los Angeles (Sat/Tue), Oakland (Wed/Thu), unnamed Japanese ports, Keelung (Wed/Thu), Hong Kong (Fri/Fri) and Yantian (Fri/Sat).
The service will no longer provide direct calls at Shanghai and Busan, but these will be picked up by the alliance’s ASX service, operated with “K” Line ships. With a faster rotation, the Y-PSW service will employ five vessels instead of six now and it will have shorter transit times from Asia to the U.S., such as Yantian to Los Angeles in 14 days instead of 17 days previously.
The first vessel of revised Y-PSW service will be the Ming Cosmos, which is expected to sail from Yantian on March 24.
“K” Line announced changes to the ASX transpacific service, including the start of direct calls at Busan and Shanghai and a new westbound call at Kobe. The fleet of the service will be expanded in March from four 2200-TEU one 2,800-TEU ships to two 2,800-TEU and three 3,500-TEU units, adding more capacity to the trade.
Yangming and COSCO take space on the service.
The revised rotation of the ASX service will be: Shanghai (Fri/Sat), Hong Kong(Mon/Tue), Busan (Thu/Fri), Long Beach (Mon/Wed), Oakland (Thu/Thu), Kobe(Tue/Tue), Busan (Wed/Wed) and Shanghai (Fri/Sat).
The first vessel in the revised service will be the Garden Bridge, sailing from Long Beach on March 5.
COSCO, “K” Line and Yangming operate seven joint Asia/West Coast of North America weekly services, as well as one Asia/U.S. East Coast all-water loop.