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Maersk's nine new 14,N000-TEUers too fat for Panama's new locks

Aug.21--SHIPPING industry experts have raised questions over whether Maersk Line's new US$1.1 billion order for nine 14,000-TEU ships are as versatile as claimed.

This comes after the world's largest ocean carrier began strengthening its fleet with hull designs that can be deployed on east-west or north-south trades without impacting on fuel consumption.

The reason being is that while China remains the world's manufacturing hub, cheaper competitors such as Mexico, Turkey and other emerging nations in Asia are growing in importance.

But Maersk is preparing for new trade patterns, according to a company statement, reported Maritime Executive from the Fort Lauderdale.

With a length of 353 metres and breadth of 53.3 metres they are too fat to pass through the new Panama Canal locks, albeit, the vessels have not been designed for a single trade.

"When I first saw the order in combination with Maersk's comments, I assumed that the dimensions of these nine 14,000-TEU ships would allow them to pass through the new Panama Canal locks, meaning that they should have a maximum breadth of 49 metres (48.77 metres, to be precise)," said Dynamar analyst Dirk Visser.

"Hence, they will actually be too large to sail via Panama and thus, perhaps, be less flexible than Maersk Line would have hoped," he said.

Nonetheless, there will remain other options where Panama doesn't come into play, such as the Far East, Europe or US east coast and east coast South America or the Far East-South Africa or Far East-Middle East trade lanes.

Even though some think that the Panama Canal Authority would be considering an upwards revision of the maximum allowed vessel-breadth (physically, the lock chambers have a width of 54 metres), that would not help these 14,000-TEU ships, said Mr Visser.

"Moreover, as there must be room in the locks for the tugboats guiding the mainline vessels in and out, we do not expect any spectacular upwards revision, if any at all."

Maersk's new ships will also require gantry cranes capable of handling 21 boxes across deck. However,N such cranes are not common at southern hemisphere ports.

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