That's No Lady...

 Many Mediterranean Shipping Company ships have feminine names, but the two most recent arrivals in Halifax have had geographical names instead. Yesterday it was the MSC Manzanillo and today the MSC Porto III.

The MSC Manzanillo has been here several times - previously in 2022 on the Turkey-Greece service and on April, 28, 2023 on the CANEX 2 service. On that latter visit it was eastbound and came in to top off cargo. On the current visit it is westbound on the CANEX 2 route and will drop off some cargo to meet St.Lawrence River draft restrictions. It is due in Montreal on February 13.

To quote from a previous post: "The MSC Manzanillo dates from 2005 when it was built by Hanjin Heavy Industry and Construction  - the forepart in Pusan and the stern and assembly in Ulsan. It is a 54,758 gt, 68,168 dwt ship with a capacity of 5060 TEU including 454 reefers.Delivered as Juliette Rickmers, it was immediately renamed Maersk Davao until 2012, then Juliette Rickmers again. In 2017 it was renamed MP The Gronk when acquired by Mangrove Partners. All Mangrove ships were named after New England Patriots football players - this one after the tight end Ron Gronkowski. As with other Mangrove ships it was bought for US$ 7.5mn then sold to MSC in 2021 for more than US$60 mn."

Manzanillo is an important port on Mexico's Pacific coast, and is on the same latitude as Mexico City and is the principal port for that city.

Today's arrival is named for the Portuguese port city of Porto (or Oporto) which had a longstanding connection to Newfoundland through fishing and is one of the closest European ports to Canada.

The MSC Porto III is also on the CANEX 2 service, but is now eastbound from Montreal and is here to top up cargo to the ship's ocean going draft. The ship has a lengthy history, since it is nearly twenty years of age. (It is due for its next survey in September). By a strange coincidence with yesterday's arrival it was also built in halves at different shipyards. In this case the forward section came from Aker Warnemunde in Rostock and was joined to the stern section from Aker MTW Werft in Wismar. The result is a 25,406gt, 33,829 dwt ship with a capacity of 2478 TEU including 400 reefers. It also carries three 45 tonne SWL cranes. I expect the cranes are seldom used in the current service to and from the Mediterranean.

The ship started life in September 2004 when it was delivered as the Frisia Lissabon but was immediately renamed Cabo Prior until 2006. It then became Cap Flinders until 2008 and Frisia Lissabon again for a short time until 2009; CSAV Santos until 2011 reverting to Frisia Lissabon again until 2017 then HSL Porto. As of January 1, 2023 it became MSC Porto III. (The Roman numeral III indicates that the ship's container capacity is less than 3,000 TEU. )

Ships are equipped with exhaust gas scrubbers these days unless their engines can use low sulphur fuel. MSC Porto III certainly did not appear to be employing a scrubber today, as it emitted a very oily black cloud as it approached the South End Terminal operated by PSA Halifax. 

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