Peter T. Leach | Apr 11, 2011 10:27AM EDT
The CKYH alliance among Cosco, "K" Line, Yang Ming and Hanjin Shipping is restructuring and upgrading its all-water services from Asia to the U.S. East Coast later this month.
The alliance, which operates five weekly loops (AWE-1 through AWE-5), said Monday it will increase the capacity of the ships on the AWE-5 service and change the ports of call on the AWE-2 and AWE-3 service by adding calls at Norfolk and Shanghai respectively.
The announcement comes a week after Hanjin and Yang Ming announced they are adding a new weekly loop from Asia to the Pacific Northwest.
As of April 24, Cosco will join the AWE-5 service, which is currently operated by Hanjin Shipping and Yang Ming with nine ships with capacities of 4,300 20-foot equivalent units each. The nine vessels will be replaced with nine ships of 5,500 TEUs apiece, of which each of the partners will deploy three.
At the end of April, the port rotations of the five all-water services will be as follows:
The AWE-1, which consists of nine 4,000-TEU vessels, will call Qingdao, Ningbo, Shanghai, Pusan, New York, Wilmington (N.C.), Savannah, Pusan and back to Qingdao.
The AWE-2, which consists of nine 4,500-TEU ships, will call Qingdao, Shanghai, Ningbo, Yokohama, Savannah, Norfolk, New York, Boston and back to Qingdao.
The AWE-3 service, which deploys nine 4,250-TEU vessels, will call Hong Kong, Yantian, Kaohsiung, Shanghai, Pusan, Savannah, Charleston, Wilmington (N.C.) and back to Hong Kong.
The AWE-4 service, which deploys nine 5,500-TEU ships, will call Ho Chi Minh City, Shekou, Hong Kong, Yantian, Singapore, Halifax, New York, Norfolk, Jacksonville, Savannah, Singapore and back to Ho Chi Minh City.
The AWE-5 service, which will upgrade to nine 5,500-TEU vessels, will call Kaohsiung, Hong Kong, Yantian, Ho Chi Minh, Singapore, New York, Norfolk, Boston, Singapore and back to Kaohsiung.
-- Contact Peter T. Leach at pleach@joc.com. Follow him on Twitter @PeterTLeach.
