All Out

 Today, December 30, was another busy day in the Port of Halifax with activity at almost every pier in advance of another long holiday weekend. Both container terminals had ships alongside and more due while Autoport had its third ship in as many days.

PSA Fairview Cove had the colourful ONE Helsinki for THE Alliance. When it sailed NYK Romulus took its berth. The coastal ConRo Nolhan Ava was also alongside loading for Argentia, NL and St-Pierre et Miquelon.

 Built in 2012 by IHI, Kure as Helsinki Bridge the 96,801gt, 96,980 dwt ONE Helsinki has a capacity of 8930 TEU according to most sources. K-Line renamed the ship in 2020 as part of the Ocean Network Express amalgamation (in 2017) of the primary Japanese container lines (K-Line, MOL and NYK) to form Ocean Network Express.

The photo shows quite clearly why a second navigating bridge was added above the orginal one. It allows for the required visibility forward when the deck load was increased to six-high container stacks. 

Predictably ONE's choice of hull colour - magenta - has not proven to be terribly practical. The paint has faded due to ultra-violet degradation (and not evenly at that.) and touch ups do not match older paint. Also the usual wear and tear, rust streaks and tug and pilot boat contact scuff marks show up much more readily than on other colours. The problem is most obvious around the pilot door, but also appears at scuppers and drains.

As one of the biggest ships to call at PSA Fairview Cove, this ship made use of the tugs Atlantic Bear (alongside) and Atlantic Oak (tehered stern escort) as it made its way outbound through the Narrows.

 PSA's Southend terminal has ZIM Yokohama alongside with APL Sentosa due on its departure. Oceanex Sanderling was also working at the Atlantic Hub, but moved to Autoport when the berth was free. When there is a space clear tomorrow the smaller Lagarfoss, in Eimskip's Green Line service, will come alongside at Pier 42. In the meantine it anchored in the lower harbour.

Autoport had the SFL Conductor in from Emden, Germany.

Built in 2006 as Favorite Ace by Shin Kurushima, Hiroshima, the 60,118 gt, 17,709 dwt ship was renamed Glovis Conductor in 2012 and SFL Conductor in 2019. It has a capacity of 6500 Car Equivalent Units. The ship gave Baltimore as its destination on departure this afternoon

There was one more notable arrival, but that will be the suject of another post. See "Name Changer".

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Still More and More Boxes

 The continuous stream of ships at PSA Halifax Atlantic Gateway continued today with little let up. The COSCO Shipping Himlayas sailed last evening and this morning another similar sized ship arrived. APL Sentosa (built by Hyundai Samho in 2014) is a regular on the joint Ocean Alliance, CMA CGM, COSCO, Evergreen, OOCL service. Although not a record setter for Halifax, its 151,015 gt, 150,936 dwt and 13,892 TEU still rates as among the larger callers. Its first call here was April 10, 2020.

Again all but the very highest of the cranes had very little room over the deck load.

Also at the south end terminal was Oceanex Sanderling which used Pier 42 for containers then moved to Pier 36 for RoRo. The ship normally uses Pier 41 (which has a RoRo ramp, but also has the largest cranes). It usually sails on Fridays for St.John's but is now scheduled to sail  late this evening  (Saturday, October 1).

As soon as Oceanex Sanderling cleared Pier 42, Eimskip's Vivienne Sheri D was inbound from offshore anchorage. That leaves ZIM Yokohama still at outside anchorage waiting its turn.

The Vivienne Sheri D is a gearless 10,965 gt, 12,640 dwt vessel built by Naval Gijon SA in Spain in 2009. It has a capacity of 925 TEU including 200 reefer plugs. Intially named Pictor J it became Pictor in 2020 and has been a regular caller for Eimskip on its Rekjavik, Halifax, Portland, Argentia, Green Line service. 

In 2021 the Canadian company Doornekamp Shipping Ltd of Odessa, ON acquired the ship with the intention of operating it for their own fleet once the Eimskip charter elapses. Doornekamp also owns the Peyton Lynn C which runs on Spliethoff's monthly Cleveland Europe Express (CEE-Way) liner service from Antwerp along with Spliethoff ships.

In the non-commercial port activity CCGS Sir William Alexander moved from BIO to Pier 9C then to the SMRT Atlantic buoy off Herring Cove, before returning to BIO. See previous post from August 22.

The ship still looks fresh from its recent refit.

Also from BIO the visting British research vessel RRS James Cook (see previous post from September 27) moved over to Pier 9C. I expect it will be loading some specialist equipment there - I see a huge winch and spools of wire and a crane setting up on the dock.

I neglected to mention in my last post that this is not the ship's first visit to Halifax. It was also here December 22, 2019.

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MSC Ornella -another first timer

 Another first time caller arrived for MSC yesterday and sailed today.

 Built in 2004 by Hanjin Heavy Industry and Construction Ltd in Busan, it is a 54,304 gt, 68,372 dwt ship with a 5050 TEU capacity. After working cargo at PSA Halifax, Pier 42 it moved early this morning to Pier 27-28 for repairs. The ship had a technical deficiency when it arrived, which was corrected, allowing the ship to sail for Montreal. 

Ships of this size are currently the largest that sail to Montreal, but due to seasonal draft restrictions they are not able to load to full capacity. Dropping off or topping up in Halifax allows the ships to sail more efficiently.

Halifax on the other had has no such restrictions (nor ice) and so can handle the largest ships currently trading to the east coast of North America, such as APL Sentosa which arrived at PSA Halifax today.

This is the second call in Halifax (see April photo above) for the 13,892 TEU ship. At 151,015 gt, 150,936 dwt it is not far off the 14,400+ TEU size of the current record holders.

Halifax still needs some more cranes to be able to handle two such ships at once, but that is unlikely to happen soon unless other lines up the size of their callers.

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Big but not biggest

Another big container ship arrived today. APL Sentosa is a 151,015 gt, 150,936 dwt (or 150,166 from other sources) vessel, but falls a bit shy of the current Halifax record for container capacity. That record, set by fleet mates APL T. Jefferson and APL A. Lincoln  is 14,414 TEU.
Inexplicably, they are smaller ships at 140,872 gt, 147,966 dwt, however APL Sentosa's declared capacity is 13,892 TEU.

The ship was built in 2014 by Hyundai Samho, and was registered in Singapore, APL's home base. Now however, the ship is registered in Malta, and that was the ship's last port of call.

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