Freight Carrier News

The Great Lakes Towing Company (GLT) on Monday unveiled plans to roll out a new breakbulk and RoRo shipping service serving the Caribbean.The Cleveland, Ohio-based company announced the formation of Great Lakes East (GLE), effectively reactivating Crimson Shipping Company’s former domestic and international marine transportation business, based out of Mobile, Ala. However, GLE will shift the primary load port to Fernandina Beach, Fla.GLE will initially service the trade with the 270- by 80-foot fully enclosed deck barge…

Polish rail freight operator PKP Cargo has rebranded its Czech subsidiary Advanced World Transport (AWT) to PKP Cargo International. Besides the new name, the Czech company has obtained a new corporate logo and colours.Advanced World Transport is the second largest rail freight carrier in the Czech Republic. In May 2015, PKP Cargo S.A. took over 80 percent shares in the company, and in November 2017 the remaining 20 percent.In December 2018, AWT acquired 80 percent shares in the company Primol-Rail d.o.o., which in 2019 received a certificate enabling provision of the rail freight on Slovenian market.Last year, the AWT comprehensive restructuring process began, which already has visible effects.

Advanced World Transport (AWT), a member of the PKP CARGO Group,  the largest rail freight carrier in Poland and a leading rail freight carrier in the European Union, has completed stage III of The Paskov Terminal modernization in the Czech Republic.A modern intermodal transshipment point in Paskov of 70,000 m2, with the capacity of 4,800 TEU and rail tracks of 3x 270 m and 2x 375 m is situated close to industrial zones and borders with Poland and Slovakia. In the Paskov Terminal AWT offers its customers comprehensive services associated with intermodal transshipment of goods.Strategic position in the heart of Europe allows for easy and fast connection to important European ports and terminals. It is situated close to the highway and it is connected to the national railway network.

Swiss  Mediterranean Shipping Co. (MSC) has finalized the acquisition of CP Carga, the freight and logistics unit of Portugal’s state-owned railway. MSC Rail, railway company of MSC, has completed the acquisition of the CP Carga - Logística e Transportes Ferroviários de Mercadorias SA, railway company established in 2009 and formerly owned by the group's entire public rail Portuguese Combois de Portugal (CP). The acquisition plan for of 95 percent of the rail freight carrier was formalized  and announced last year, but the Portuguese authorities gave their consent in December 2015. With the transaction MSC Rail got the 95% stake in the Portuguese company, while the remaining 5% will be offered to employees of the railway company.

Neptune Orient Lines Ltd (NOL)  has officially confirmed that it is a takeover target of two separate companies: French shipping company CMA CGM and Danish conglomerate AP Moeller-Maersk. As per a report in the Business Times, NOL said in an announcement on Saturday evening that it was in preliminary talks with the two "with respect to a potential acquisition of NOL". "There is no assurance that any such discussions will result in any definitive agreement or transaction, or that any offer for NOL will be made or as to the terms on which any such offer might be made," it said. The firm has been looking for a buyer for months. NOL, controlled by Singapore’s state investor Temasek Holdings, has been struggling in a prolonged downturn in the global shipping market.

Singapore Sovereign Wealth Fund Temasek Holdings has put Neptune Orient Lines (NOL) up for sale, says a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report. The WSJ reported that Temasek was in talks with one buyer in recent months but the two sides could not agree on a price for the loss-making company. The WSJ put NOL's market capitalization at 2.3 billion Singapore dollars ($1.7 billion). The report, citing unnamed sources, said the liner company has been "shopped to prospective buyers" in recent months. NOL is about 67 per cent owned by Temasek, going by Bloomberg data. The company had been in talks with a prospective buyer, but "the two sides couldn't agree on price", added the report.

Singapore state investment company Temasek Holdings has put up its struggling $1.7 billion shipping company for sale, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Neptune Orient Lines Ltd (NOL), 65 percent-owned by Temasek, announced in February the sale of its logistics business to Japanese freight carrier Kintetsu World Express Inc for $1.2 billion. NOL's move to sell its logistics business had renewed market speculation of a sale of the entire company. An NOL spokeswoman declined to comment, while Temasek Holdings was not immediately available after office hours. Reporting by Shubhankar Chakravorty and Anshuman Daga

Fabrication teams at Vigor Industrial’s Tacoma, Wash. shipyard have delivered three 60’ x 24’ x 15.5’ breasting barges to Foss Maritime. The barge system will be used to moor Shell’s drill rigs at Terminal 5 in Seattle, Wash. where the company is scheduled to ready its fleet for Arctic drilling this summer. The project was completed in less than two months and created 60 family wage jobs for the Tacoma yard and its subcontractors. “We are so pleased that our Tacoma shipyard is now building new vessels,” said Bryan Nichols, Vigor Fab sales manager.

Japanese freight carrier Kintetsu World Express Inc is buying Singapore's APL Logistics for US$1.2 billion, paying a higher than anticipated price for an overseas deal at a time of slow domestic growth. Tokyo-headquartered Kintetsu Express said on Tuesday that it agreed to pay S$1.6 billion to buy all of APL's shares from its parent, Neptune Orient Lines (NOL). Its own capital and bank loans will be used to fund the deal, it said. The sale of APL Logistics to the Japanese company will enable NOL to concentrate on its core but troubled container-shipping business. The Singapore Company said the deal will “unlock the value of the logistics business for its shareholders and strengthen the financial position of the NOL Group”.

Hamburg Süd has been recognized for the first time with the “Carrier of the Year” Award by the internationally operating transport and logistics group, Panalpina, based in Basle/Switzerland. Peter Frederiksen, Member of the Executive Board of Hamburg Süd, accepted the award at the shipping company’s headquarters in Hamburg in mid-January. The Panalpina Award is the result of the “Panalpina Ocean Freight Carrier Survey 2014”, for which the company asks around 1,700 employees worldwide to evaluate their daily dealings with various shipping lines according to different criteria.

The appointment of Tim Marsh as senior vice president sales and marketing by Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd is aimed at bolstering its battered intermodal business, says a report from Globe and Mail. Marsh, who brings 25 years of international shipping industry sales and marketing experience, most recently served as executive VP North America Trade Division for Cosco Container Lines (COCSO), the global shipping giant. CP has lost some big intermodal customers to Canadian National Railway Co., and appears to be taking a big step toward winning new contracts in the business of handling containers that travel by ship, rail and truck. Marsh will lead a sales team that has recently lost the intermodal business of APL Ltd., Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, and Orient Overseas Container Line Ltd.

$1 Million Settlement Enhances Land and Sea in the Eastern District of Texas. BEAUMONT, Texas — U.S. Attorney John M. Bales announced a settlement reached with a European shipping corporation has resulted in significant enhancements to nature conservation groups in the Eastern District of Texas. The $1 million settlement was announced at a press conference on the banks of Village Creek in Hardin County, Texas today. CIMPSHIP Transportes Maritimos, S.A., a Portuguese corporation headquartered in Funchal, Portugal, was initially indicted in 2010 and charged with conspiring to violate environmental laws causing willful pollution of waterways within the Eastern District of Texas.

Staff from four leading international forwarders have voted Hapag-Lloyd the best shipping line for 2012. Kühne + Nagel (“Best Carrier Award”) and DB Schenker (“Ocean Carrier of the Year”), now Hellmann Worldwide Logistics (“Global Carrier Award”) and Panalpina (“Global Ocean Freight Carrier Survey”) have awarded Hapag-Lloyd highest grades for quality and customer service. “These awards make us especially proud as they come from our customers’ staff, the people who work daily with Hapag-Lloyd worldwide: Those who can really judge and value the high quality of our services,” says Michael Behrendt, Chairman of the Executive Board of Hapag-Lloyd. More and more major shippers are having staff evaluate their most important suppliers using satisfaction questionnaires.

While catamaran and multi-hull vessel technology is increasingly being explored for its potential in high-speed military and logistical support applications, Rolls-Royce has unveiled a proposal for a fast naval sealift ship based on a monohull RoPax ferry design. The impulse for developing a vessel type with that rare combination of exceptional speed and relatively high payload capacity originates from the changing emphasis in military support requirements, not least the deployment of rapid response forces to distant areas at short notice. The project has also been driven by a general trend towards faster combatants and the complementary need for a faster speed of back-up and replenishment. The Rolls-Royce proposal entails a 4,000-dwt vessel of 581 ft.

Hvide Marine Incorporated (HMI) and subsidiary Sun State Marine Services, Inc., recently christened the first in a series of new cargo ships at its U.S. shipyard facility in Green Cove Springs, Florida. Constructed entirely on-site by Sun State Marine Services, Inc., the 190-foot 'landing craft' type freight vessel is specially designed and ideally suited for conducting trade with Bahamian and Caribbean markets that have minimal or unimproved facilities. "The landing craft has a reinforced hull that allows use of unimproved landing sites such as beaches or boat ramps by actually grounding the forward part of the vessel," noted Robert J. Coppedge, vice president of Sun State Marine Services, Inc.

MacGregor is scheduled to retrofit three sets of flood control doors to a RoPax freight carrier constructed in 1990. The flood control barrier system from MacGregor includes the retrofit of three sets of single-section top-hinged flood control doors. MacGregor's specialists will perform this work during the vessel's docking from September - November of this year.

Every year, MarineNews chooses a handful of vessels delivered in the past 12 months and bestows upon them the distinction of “Great Boats.” The boats are chosen for innovations in design, construction and utilization. Following are the 17 vessels or groups of vessels chosen as the Great Boats of 2000. Crowley Marine Services delivered Alert, Attentive, and Aware, a series of three 140-ft., 10,000-hp Prevention and Response Tugs (PRTs), to Alyeska Pipeline Service Company in Valdez, Alaska. Specifically designed and developed for Alyeska, the boats will be used by Crowley in the Trans Alaska Pipeline System trade. Alert was deployed in February; Attentive was delivered in June, and Aware was delivered in July.

Nordic prowess in ferry technology, coupled with Irish business verve, is set to take the sector to a new highpoint as regards the concentration of wheeled freight capacity in a RoRo passenger vessel. Built in the cruise ferry mold, Irish Ferries' 50,000-gt Ulysses embodies 4,100 lane-meters of garaging for trucks on four decks. The vessel is an eloquent testament to the operator's robust traffic development, and its perception of new opportunities arising from unprecedented growth in the Irish economy, foreign trade and tourism. Although P&O North Sea Ferries' 60,600-gt Pride of Rotterdam, nearing completion at Fincantieri's Marghera yard…

The European Commission authorized a French aid scheme to promote inland waterway transport. The Commission agreed to a French aid scheme for inland waterway transport. This scheme will be in force during the period 2004-2007 with a budget of between €14.5 and €15 million per annum. The aim of this new scheme is to encourage the development of inland waterway transport in France through fleet modernisation and by promoting the occupation of inland waterway carrier. Any inland waterway freight carrier operating in France is potentially eligible for this aid. The scheme takes over the inland waterway transport aid plan for the period 2001-2003.[1] The new scheme also proposes new aid designed to take better account of current market conditions. The aid plan is in two main parts.

Based in Coos Bay Oregon, Sause Brothers Towing has been towing between Pacific Northwest and Southern Californian ports for over 50 years. A new double-hulled 105,000-barrel oil barge, Sunset Bay, is currently alongside at the company shipyard in Coos Bay. With the hull built at the Gunderson yard in Portland it is being outfitted by Sause. Also at the yard, the ocean going tug Powhatan is undergoing an extensive repower that will see a pair of 850 HP engines replaced with a pair of Cummins KTA50 M2 mains each rated for 1500 HP at 1800 RPM. A new pair of Reintjes WAF772 marine gears with 7.45:1 ratios have also been installed in the 105x30-foot tug.

As a response to the marine market's demand for higher power concentrations and increased plant reliability, deliverable at competitive cost, the new offering from Rolls-Royce is stimulating fresh interest within a conservative shipping industry in gas turbine-based solutions. Building on the company's huge investments in aero engine technology over the past decade, the MT30 gas turbine has been specifically prepared for shipboard applications, combining power density and operating attributes in a manner intended to widen the appeal of gas turbine power among the maritime community. With 36-MW obtainable from a compact unit of barely 9-m (30-ft) in length…

The actual extent of European public funding to promote a modal shift from road to waterborne transportation has up until now — been far outweighed by political discourse on the subject — no doubt designed to appeal to the popular, environmentalist vote. However, a recently more pragmatic approach by government to the issue, coupled with the maritime industries' development of new technical solutions for efficient, intra-regional freight exchange, suggests that the tide might be turning in favor of short-sea shipping. An appreciation that economic and environmental considerations are increasingly intertwined, and that environmental performance bears more and more on competitive position…