Please be aware that current world events are creating shipping delays that are affecting our arrival dates. Due to the low water circumstances in the Panama Canal and the problems at the Suez Canal, we’re seeing anywhere from a 1-2 week delay in vessel port arrivals. We’re tracking these vessels and updating our system arrival dates as they become available. Many updates were noted on the system today.
For example, all Korean goods that were due on Jan 5 are now noted to arrive by Jan 17.
Goods that were previously scheduled for delivery on Jan 12 have been updated to Jan 19.
There will be more.
For additional details, here is some info provided by one of our overseas freight brokers, CH Robinson (who may be one of the largest in the world).
A quick update on the Panama Canal and Suez Canal situations as there is a lot of news coverage going on right now that you may or may not have seen. As you have probably been hearing, the Panama Canal has been dealing with low water levels for the past several months. There was hope that the rainy season would bring much needed rain to raise the levels but that really didn’t come to fruition, and they continue to experience a drought in the region. For months, we have been hearing that container vessels are not being too impacted and have been able to move through the canal with little to no delays. Meanwhile, the press was publishing stories about 21 day waiting times in the canal and we simply were not seeing those types of delays.
Fast forward to December and we have started hearing about container vessels having trouble securing appointments at the Panama Canal. This development has caused several s/s lines to begin routing their shipments through the Suez Canal. Typically, this time of routing is pretty common and is not going to have much of an impact on transit times. Well, that all went out the window last week as we started to hear reports of vessels being attacked off the coast of Yemen in the Red Sea. Houthi rebels have now launched 100 attacks against 12 different commercial and merchant vessels in the Red Sea in the last month and we are starting to see many s/s lines announce that they will be temporarily suspending services through the Red Sea and routing vessel’s around the Cape of Good hope (South Africa).
So, what does this mean? For starters, we are likely going to see some extended transit times from Busan. Any shipment that gets routed around the Cape of Good Hope is going to add about 14 days to your standard transit times
Over the past week, more than 25 vessels have been rerouted to the Cape of Good Hope from the Suez Canal. That number will likely continue to grow due to ongoing war risks in the Red Sea and the drought in the Panama Canal.
Since 29% of global ocean traffic travels through the Suez Canal, be advised that rerouting or pausing even a portion of those vessels can have a significant impact, not just to trade that moves via the Red Sea, but across all global trade lanes. Blank sailings and rate increases are expected to continue across many trades into Q1 of 2024.
As capacity continues to tighten, carriers will likely reshuffle vessels to trade lanes with the most demand, in some lanes we are already seeing this happen. Be advised, the industry could also experience an equipment imbalance, particularly in Asia, as delays in backhaul services will reduce the number of empty boxes available.
Written by
Andrea Jackson
