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Keel laying ceremony for GREG MORTIMER, first expedition cruise ship for SunStone Ships on China Merchants Heavy Industries yard at Haimen, China. It is the first ship of a series of 4+6 of infinity class vessels. Learn more about the ships with X-Bow design: http://cruisedeck.de/infinity-klasse-fuer-sunstone-ships/

Catching up with the changing time, Visakhapatnam Port Trust is in the process of converting east quay two to five berths built in 1933 into multi-cargo berths by increasing the draft to handle fully-laden Panamax vessels with a deadweight tonnage of two lakh by October. As part of modernisation, the port authorities realised that the berths have turned too old to handle cargo and have completed dismantling them. Now work is at apace to raise the draft from 11 metres to 14.5 metres. “By mobilising resources from internal accruals, we want to develop two Panamax compatible berths at cost of Rs. 190.5 crore,” VPT Deputy Chairman P.L. Haranadh has told The Hindu. The new berths will have a capacity to handle 6.45 million tonne per annum. Ships with overall length of 230 metres can be navigated easily overcoming the restrictions due to the channel. Cargoes like steel, granite, foodgrains and project equipment and material are expected. After completion, according to sources, the port may entrust the job of managing the berths on operation and management contract or tonnage basis by floating tenders. One of the old berths has the glorious history of receiving passenger ship S.S. Jaladurga.

The chaotic traffic situation at the seaports in Lagos has resulted in about 1100 percent hike in the cost of transportation of imported goods from the ports in Apapa to surrounding towns in Lagos. Vanguard’s finding revealed that transportation of a 20 feet container from Apapa to Ikeja which used to be N25,000 has now risen to about N300,000. Confirming the above, President/CEO of NICSOL Worldwide Investment Limited, Mr. Nicodemus Odolo, said the bad roads have affected the movement of goods to and from the port as well as the cost of movement of consignments to and from the port.

The 335,000-barrel-per-day Isla refinery operated by Venezuela’s state-run PDVSA in Curacao is working at minimum capacity while awaiting new crude shipments and as a tanker backlog in the country’s ports began to ease, four sources close to the facility told Reuters. PDVSA’s operations this year have been mired by problems ranging from fast-declining crude production and poor refining due to a lack of equipment, to obstacles for exporting oil amid port congestion and financial sanctions. Only a few units at the Curacao refinery have been operating during U.S. producer ConocoPhillips’ moves to seize PDVSA’s inventories, cargoes and facilities following a $2 billion arbitration award by the International Chamber of Commerce in April.

Ponant's latest expedition cruise ship LE LAPEROUSE, first one of a series of six, started her maiden voyage around Iceland. http://cruisedeck.de/le-laperouse-auf-jungfernfahrt/

Operations at the Manila International Container Terminal are set to be fast-tracked soon following the delivery of two new giant cranes, according to the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA). A report on GMA News’ “Balitanghali” on Sunday said that each crane is capable of unloading as much as 14,000 container units from a ship. Eight more rubber tire gantry cranes are expected to arrive in November, and two more quay cranes are set to arrive next year. Source: GMA News

The decommissioning of a significant part of the tanker fleet is about to alleviate the current oversupply issues, as evidenced by the record-breaking pace of demolition activity this year. In its latest weekly report, Clarkson Platou Hellas commented that “with the end of an eventful week in Athens for the bi-annual Posidonia, Owners, Cash Buyers and other industry players were able to come together and discuss what has been an active first half of the year in the recycling market. With the main topic of discussion still being tanker units, it currently looks to be a record year for tanker recycling and many questions and discussions were being raised for this sector which should ensure the supply for these types of units to continue and interestingly, the topic of ‘green recycling’ was evident.

This year, the situation at Chittagong again deteriorated. So far this June, vessels have had to wait more than a week at outer anchorage. Despite several measures taken to prevent it, congestion at Chittagong Port, Bangladesh’s prime seaport, is increasing,...

China Merchants Port Holdings Co (CMPort) finalized the acquisition of the Australian port of Newcastle, according to the company’s website. Newcastle, located in the state of New South Wales, is the largest port on Australia’s east coast, and the world’s largest coal export port. bThe acquisition of the Australian port expands CMPort’s network to six continents. CMPort acquired Brazil’s second-largest container terminal Paranaguá Container Terminal in February. Source: Global Times

Marseille Provence in France has welcomed MSC Cruises’ newest ship MSC Seaview during its inaugural call. The arrival was witnessed by Patrick J. Pourbaix, managing director of MSC Cruises, the ship’s captain and Jean-François Suhas, chairman of the Marseille Provence Cruise Club. It was celebrated with a traditional key and plaque ceremony organised by the Marseille Provence Cruise Club. At 323 metres long and 41 metres wide, the cruise ship can carry 5179 passengers with a crew of 1413. Delivered on 4 June by Fincantieri de Monfalcone shipyard in Italy, MSC Seaview is the 15th ship in the MSC Cruises fleet.

Railport Antwerp, a joint initiative by Antwerp Port Authority, the Left Bank Development Corporation and the industry associations Essenscia Vlaanderen and VOKA-Alfaport, is to expand its activities. The company will actively serve rail transport in the port, including intermodal container transport, with the aim of doubling the proportion of rail transport in the port of Antwerp over the next few years. An important step in this process is the appointment of Nils van Vliet as CEO.

he Port of Cork marked a major milestone for the company today with the launch of the new Cork Container Terminal development in Ringaskiddy. The Cork Container Terminal will initially offer a 360-metre quay with 13-metre depth alongside and will enable larger ships to berth in Ringaskiddy. The development also includes the construction of a 13.5 hectare terminal and associated buildings as well as two ship to shore gantry cranes and container handling equipment. The requirement for the development of new container handling facilities at Ringaskiddy was identified in the Port of Cork’s Strategic Development plan in 2010.

(TheLoadstar) The UK’s major container gateway of Felixstowe is expected to continue experiencing severe congestion after the troubled implementation of a new IT system. An advisory issued by MSC said all carriers calling at the port were still experiencing “significant delays”. “MSC expects these delays to continue, which will affect vessel arrival times and collection and delivery slots. “We continue to work very closely with the port of Felixstowe to mitigate this situation and we are working hard to minimise the impact on our customers.” Its 2M partner, Maersk, also advised customers it was working with the port to resolve the issues, and Cosco issued a notification citing “severe delays”, which it said were leading to “serious service failures”. One source told The Loadstar the delays had resulted in the port suspending rail import services, although a spokesperson for the port denied this.

Thousands of containers containing recyclable and used materials are piling up at seaports in the localities of Hải Phòng, HCM City and Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu, reducing the productivity and efficiency of ports’ operations and negatively affecting the import-export activities of Vietnamese enterprises. According to the report issued by the Việt Nam Maritime Administration, by the end of May, nearly 28,000 containers were stuck at seaports, including nearly 6,800 containers in Hải Phòng City ports, 14,600 in HCM City and about 6,500 in Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu Province. The main causes, the administration supposes, are changes in international trade policies which create uncertainties in the market forecast. China, for example, announced to stop importing 24 types of used and recyclable materials from January, 2018. The huge amount of those goods has to find its own way to other Asian countries including Việt Nam.

Pakistan’s thermal coal importers will have to discharge all of their cargoes at Port Qasim from August, after the country’s Supreme Court banned the unloading of thermal coal at the nearby Karachi port, shipping sources said. A notice has been served to the Karachi Port Trust, the administrator of the country’s largest maritime gateway, saying that only those vessels whose bills of lading have declared Karachi as the port of discharge will be allowed to call until the end of July, a shipping source close to the matter said.

India declared to make Chabahar Port in Iran operational by 2019, regardless of threat of transformed US sanctions against Tehran. Chabahar port complex in Iran is a new transportation access strip for land-locked Afghanistan, which may result in opening way for millions of dollars in trade and cut its dependence on Pakistan. Chahbahar Port is located on the Gulf of Oman and is considered to be Iran’s only oceanic port consisting of two separate ports named Shahid Kalantari and Shahid Beheshti each of them containing five berths. It provides Iran access to the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean without having to cross through the bottlenecked Strait of Hormuz. It also opens up doors to take advantage of Indian infrastructure advancements that promise reliable connectivity to Afghanistan and Central Asia.

Costa Cruises and Italian shipbuilder Fincantieri have celebrated the official float-out of Costa Venezia, the first ship designed and built specifically for the Chinese market. The ceremony was held at Fincantieri shipyard in Monfalcone, Italy, where the ship is being built. “Costa Venezia marks a new era not just for Costa Cruises and Fincantieri but for the Chinese cruise industry as a whole,” said Mario Zanetti, president of Costa Group Asia. “From its initial conception all the way through to today’s float-out ceremony and beyond, everything about Costa Venezia has been designed with the Chinese consumer in mind. Costa Venezia will continue to deliver on Costa Cruises’ authentic Italian experience while also providing a unique vacation experience that will resonate with Chinese guests by being fully tailored to their travel preferences.

The Port of Virginia is one of the most significant ports in the United States. It facilitates $242 million worth of commerce a day, and a full 9 percent — or 343,000 — of Virginia’s jobs are port-related. But there’s a problem. It’s not big enough. Not when cargo ships have gotten bigger, which threatens both business and safety. Experts say deepening and widening of the port at its channel is crucial. Rick Wester, captain of the Port of Virginia, notes the channel isn’t wide enough with ships double or triple the size they were a decade ago. “About three of four times a week, whenever [the biggest ships] enter or leave port, I have to impose one-way traffic because it’s just too narrow for them to meet any other ships,” he said. Furthermore, the channel is only 50 feet deep, which means many of the larger ships would run aground if fully loaded. Wester explains, “These ships draw 55 feet [so] we don’t allow them to come into port… they can only partially load both coming in and leaving—they’ve not using their capacity.” Over 114,000 U.S. businesses rely on goods from the Port of Virginia, but the channel is limiting its ability to expand. Thus there’s a plan to dredge and widen the waterway — it’s even caught the attention of President Trump, who stated the port “could be one of the best in the world if they invested not that much money, relatively speaking.” How much is that? Around a billion dollars. Virginia has already secured $695 million in private and state investment, and the state is asking for $300 million more from the federal government.

In a contentious move, an expert appraisal committee (EAC) of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests has recommended granting of Environmental Clearance and CRZ clearance for the Phase-III expansion of the Kamarajar Port Ltd (KPL) in Ennore. In a meeting last month, the EAC had recommended the clearance based on the draft Coastal Zone Management Plan (CZMP) 2018. However, environmental activists termed it illegal as a writ petition against the draft CZMP was pending in the Madras High Court.

(Reuters) – A fire in the hold of a bulker ship on Monday briefly closed Australia’s Port Kembla, the second-largest coal export port in New South Wales state, stopping shipping for eight hours. The port was shut soon after the blaze began before dawn on the MV Iron Chieftain as it unloaded dolomite, a mineral used in steelmaking which was destined for BlueScope Steel Ltd’s nearby blast furnace. No injuries were reported. “Shipping recommenced and the port reopened at 1130 (0130 GMT) and is expected to be back on schedule by around 1700,” harbor master Kell Dillon said in an emailed statement. More than 100 firefighters were working to put fire out, a job likely to take all day, a spokesman for Fire and Rescue NSW told Reuters. Pictures showed water being sprayed from tugboats and fire engines into the ship’s hold.