The Canadian owned shipping company Fednav continues to grow and now has a fleet of about 120 ships. That represents some 64 owned and 97 long term chartered. It also employs ships for short term and voyage charters to meet demand.
A goodly portion of the fleet, some 47 ships, consists of Handysize / Lakers, built to transit the St.Lawrence Seaway to the Great Lakes carrying bulk or break bulk cargoes. It has eight more ships of this size on order for delivery over the next two years, set to replace a comparable number of 23 to 25 year olds.
Easily spotted with red hull and tan superstructure, the Handysize / Lakers have three and sometimes four cranes. They are also relatively new ships averaging about twelve years of age.
Today, December 21, one of the older ships in the fleet, the Federal Yukon arrived in Halifax to top up a bulk cargo of grain. (Due to a heavy snow fall and temporarily blocked streets, no photo was possible - maybe tomorrow.)
The Federal Yukon was built in 2000 by Fednav's favourite shipyard, Oshima Shipbuilding in Oshima, Japan. It is one of the eight ships to be replaced by eight new ships from the same shipyard. The 20,659 gt, 36,253 dwt ship carries three 30 tonne SWL cargo cranes. Although this ship has never called in Halifax before to my knowledge, some other ships of the same class have called here, usually to top off grain cargoes or for repairs.
Federal Rideau was here in September 6, 2022 en route from Brazil to Baie Comeau, QC with a cargo of bauxite and was met by divers.
On its current voyage the Federal Yukon left the western European port of Gent (Ghent), Belgium, September 29, passing Calais and Dover the same day. It transited the Strait of Gibraltar October 6 and was recorded arriving in Arzew, Algeria October 9. (Arzew is a major fertilizer and salt exporting port.) It was recorded westbound in the Strait of Gibraltar November 1.
Crossing the Atlantic, the ship arrived in Trois-Rivières, QC November 15 and remained there until November 21. It sailed directly to the St.Lawrence Seaway arriving in Toronto November 22. Unloading took until December 6 when it moved to Hamilton. I am assuming it must have discharged remaining cargo (if any) there then loaded its current grain cargo. That took until December 14. Due to draft restrictions in the Seaway, the ship could not load a full cargo, so on clearing the Seaway December 17 it headed for Halifax where it can top up to ocean draft.
Loading in Halifax may take some time as it can only be done in good weather, but could only take a day or two in favourable conditions.
Addendum:
Despite the snow, I manged to dig myself out enough to get down to Pier 28 too see the Federal Yukon alongside with some grain spouts deployed and ready to load. The ship appears to be very lightly loaded, so may not have taken on much if any cargo in Hamilton. That suggests that what it will load in Halifax is wood pellets for hog fuel.
Halifax Grain Elevators imports, stores and exports grains, soy and wood pellets, all from the same facility, and it is done mostly "invisibly" through enclosed conveyors. Built in stages when Halifax exported large quantities of grain in winter due to rail subsidies, the current facility has a capacity of 5 million bushels (140,000 tonnes) of grain, but is rarely full.
The view above does not show the entire structure. There is another, smaller, rank of siloes behind.
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