The persistent drought on the Panama Canal is forcing more and more shipping companies to reroute their ships. At THE Alliance, this affects three services at once.
Due to the lack of water in the Gatun Reservoir and the resulting growing congestion in front of the Panama locks, the container alliance THE Alliance will be sending a number of ships to their destination ports via the Suez Canal in future.
The Panama Canal Authority ACP had previously announced its intention to further reduce the number of daily transits from January, with only five slots available for Neo-Panamax ships per day instead of the previous eight.
Four additional ships for Panama detour
The member shipping companies of THE Alliance (THEA) are therefore sending all ships via the Suez Canal in the west. Specifically, this involves three services between Asia and the US East Coast – the EC 1 (14 ships, 13,090 TEU-13,470 TEU), the EC 2 (13 ships, 13,090 TEU-13,470 TEU) and the EC 6 (11 ships, 6,700 TEU-8,760 TEU)
The detour is initially planned for six to eight weeks, but could be extended if the situation at the locks does not improve, according to reports. Due to the longer distance of the new Suez route, four additional ships of 8,500 TEU to 13,470 TEU are to be deployed.
