Member lines of the Oceania Vessel Sharing Agreement (OVSA) plan to temporary suspend Oakland port call to improve the reliability of their US West Coast – Australasia Loop 2 (WAN) Service.
The decision was triggered by a desire to relieve the ongoing congestion issues in US West Coast ports which have cut vessel production across the West Coast.
Namely, vessels have been forced to anchor due to slow vessel turn times in the ports resulting in growing backlog of anchored vessels in Seattle/Tacoma, Oakland and Los Angeles/Long Beach.
Ten-to-fifteen ships are anchored in San Francisco Bay daily awaiting berths at Oakland marine terminals.
The Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) warned that the US West Coast port operations are approaching complete gridlock which may result in shutdown of ports.
The first vessel not calling at Oakland will be the 37,882 tonne containership Cap Pasado (voyage 920N / 924S) eta USOAK on February 6, 2015, German carrier Hapag Lloyd said.
All Oakland import cargo currently loaded on this vessel will be discharged in Vancouver, BC to connect to a feeder with an ETA in Oakland of February 10, 2015.
Cargo volume has reached an all-time high at the Port of Oakland. Only last month Oakland handled 74,356 loaded import containers.
OVSA members are Hamburg Süd, Hapag-Lloyd, Maersk Line, and ANL-USL.
World Maritime News Staff