Maersk news and double header - in the fog

There were two Maersk container ships in Halifax today, July 1 (Canada's national holiday) but very few people got to see them because of a real old fashioned pea soup fog. With visibility at near zero there were audible fog signals, but the only visual signs for ship watchers were the electronic images on AIS and for other boat and ship operators, the radar blips.

(The fog was so thick than an air show by the RCAF Snowbirds was cancelled, and the evening fireworks were also in question.)

The first arrival was somewhat unusual, in that it was a westbound ship on Maersk / CMA CGM's St-Laurent-1 service. Volga Maersk, sailing from Antwerp June 22, would normally have proceeded directly to Montreal, but put in to Halifax at 0600 at the pilot station and sailed at 1300. It docked at Pier 31, a berth that has no container cranes, so the visit was not to lighten off cargo as far as I could tell (with zero visibility).

Volga Maersk showing off its new white lettering on June 10, eastbound.

 The second arrival (at time ofwriting) is Vistula Maersk on its eastbound St-Laurent-1 voyage from Montreal en route to Bremerhaven. There is nothing unusual about its visit, except that it is due at the pilot station at 1800. APL Sentosa (Columbus Jax) and Vivienne Sheri D (Eimskip) already occupy the berth 41 and 42 at PSA Halifax, so the Maersk ship will hold off until there is room to dock. Both of the other ships are schedueld for 1730 departures.

 

Vistula Maersk in the old black lettering, May 5, 2023.

Maersk, long the world's largest container line, gave up that title to MSC earlier this year as it decided to concentrate on being a logistics provider. Last month MSC also became the first shipping line to exceed 5 million TEU capacity. In the very next short while MSC will also have the largest owned fleet (most lines have many chartered ships). Currently only 66,000 TEU behind Maersk in the "owned" category, that gap will be erased as MSC takes delivery of three new megamax ships.

MSC is still buying older ships (although it is also sending some of its oldies to scrap) and has 122 new ships of 1,556,631 TEU on order or building. Maersk has "only" 28 ships on order for 366,600 TEU. As an aside, MSC also claims to be the world's largest privately owned cruise line in terms of revenue at $22.86 billion from 1.4 million passengers on 21 ships. Carnival Corporation has more than 100 ships however, but less revenue at $12.2 billion from 5.8 million passengers.)

In the container capacity contest MSC now rates at 5,073,462 TEU and Maersk at 4,127,158. Coming up in the outside lane however is CMA CGM, now in third place with 3,497,566 TEU. With 112 ships on order for an added 998,073 TEU CMA CGM is set to overtake Maersk.

The container lines are flush with cash after the boom last year, and so have ordered ships willly nilly. But with rates collapsing to below pre-COVID rates on Pacific routes, the building boom will have to be followed by a major scrapping program in order to maintain the supply / demand balance.

Maersk may be the wise ones, but only time will tell. In the interim there will likely be many changes in the lineups as the shipping lines try to make a profit by rastionalizing services. Mergers and reorganizaitons are not out of the question either.

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