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News
One of World's Biggest Container Ships Makes Maiden Call @ Port of LB
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Photo courtesy Port of Long Beach |
(Oct. 14, 2004) -- One of the biggest container ships on the planet -- the Switzerland-based Mediterranean Shipping’s 8,200-TEU MSC Texas -- has made its maiden call at the Port of Long Beach, docking on Oct. 12 at SSAT’s Pier A container terminal.
It's 1,095.8 feet long (longer than three football fields), 140.4 feet wide (30 feet wider than the Panama Canal) and has a draft of 47.6 feet.
Four other firms have 8,000-TEU ships calling in Long Beach: Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL), China Shipping, China Ocean Shipping Co. (COSCO), and CMA CGM.
A Port of LB release says, "The Texas was designed to minimize impact on air quality and to preserve seawater quality. Its less-polluting diesel engines and advanced waste-storage systems place the Texas among the cleanest of its class. Per TEU, the Texas’ air emissions and fuel consumption are 20 percent less than for the previous generation of transpacific vessels. The ship’s hull was painted with tin-free, self-polishing and anti-fouling paint."
The release also says:
The new MCS vessel is able to carry enough cargo to completely fill a 1 million-square-foot regional shopping center with clothing, shoes, toys and other products stacked eight feet high. The Texas is among a new generation of 8,000-twenty-foot-equivalent-unit (TEU) vessels that have begun to call at the Port of Long Beach, one of the few U.S. ports with the deep channels and large shipping terminals capable of handling these giant vessels fully loaded.
The Texas is the first of at least eight 8,200-TEU vessels that Mediterranean Shipping Co. has ordered from shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries of South Korea. MSC will deploy two of the giant vessels in a transpacific service with its French alliance partner, CMA CGM, that calls in China in Xiamen, Chiwan, Hong Kong and Yantian, then across the Pacific to Long Beach and back to Xiamen.
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