A new container service has been launched at the Port of Seattle by shipping giants Maersk Line and CMA CGM, connecting the US west coast with Asia.
The pendulum service, which calls at Tanjung Pelepas, Hong Kong, Yantian, Shanghai, Busan, Seattle, Vancouver and back at Tanjung, is serviced by 14 ships with capacities of 6,500 TEUs.
Seattle marks the first inbound port on the rotation, with the SeaLand New York the first vessel on the service to arrive at Settle on Sunday 7 June.
'This is a great new service that takes advantage of Seattle's technologically advanced terminals and outstanding intermodal capabilities,' the port's managing director Charlie Sheldon told the Seattle Business Examiner. 'We're happy to have these two leading carriers in our harbour and we look forward to working with them to grow our port.'
The Port of Seattle will see the service as a welcome boost after news that container volumes fell by more than 25 per cent through April compared with 2008, echoing a similar state of affairs at most of the country's west-coast ports.
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