Ship Charterer News

Global fuel suppliers are turning to longer and costlier routes that produce more carbon emissions to move their diesel and other products as Western restrictions on Russian cargoes have reshuffled global energy shipping patterns.As a result of the European Union ban on Russian fuel that started on Feb. 5, tankers carrying clean oil products such as gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and naphtha are traveling between 16 and 18 days to bring Russian supplies to Brazil or U.S. cargoes to Europe…

General average has been declared for the ZIM Charleston after stacks of containers caught fire on board the vessel earlier this month.The fire broke out in a cargo hold while the Seaspan-owned containership was navigating off Colombo, Sri Lanka on August 8. It has been reported that approximately 300 containers may have been affected by fire, heat and smoke, as well as water damage from firefighting operations.Investigators are working to determine the cause of the fire and gauge full extent of the damage.Meanwhile…

Belgian shipowner Exmar reported a wider loss in the first quarter of 2022 as it continued to seek a user to charter one of its giant liquefied natural gas (LNG) ships.Exmar, which offers maritime and offshore services, reported a consolidated loss after tax of $7.7 million in the first three months, against a loss of $2.2 million a year earlier.Earnings were hit by two of Exmar's mammoth floating storage and regasification units (FSRU) being out of use during the quarter, but…

More than 100 containers have been lost from a fire-stricken containership off British Columbia, well above original estimates, the Canadian Coast Guard said.Initial reports indicated that the Malta-flagged Zim Kingston lost roughly 40 boxes near the Strait of Juan de Fuca, on October 22, after heavy weather caused the vessel to list 35 degrees while traveling from Busan, South Korea to Vancouver, Canada.A fire that broke out on board on October 23 led to the loss of additional containers, and by Wednesday the Canadian Coast Guard said the number of lost boxes has risen to 109.

Light Structures AS and Japanese shipbuilder Sumitomo Heavy Industries Marine & Engineering (SHI-ME) entered into an agreement for delivery of comprehensive hull stress and fatigue monitoring systems on two newbuild 115,000 DWT Aframax crude oil tankers due for delivery in Q2 2023 and Q3 2023.Hull stress monitoring is usually the preserve of larger ships and platforms, or very specialized vessels, but its deployment on Aframax vessels reflects a growing interest in long-term structural monitoring due to the safety and financial benefits it can enable…

The Crimson Polaris wood-chip carrier's bow section was towed into Japan's Hachinohe Port and moored there on August 27, according to the ship's charterer NYK. The Crimson Polaris split up after running aground near Hachinohe, Japan earlier this month."Due to the weather and sea conditions, the work to remove the oil from the bow of the vessel at sea was expected to take a long time, and in order to make the work smoother and safer, the shipowner and ship-management company towed and moored the vessel in Hachinohe Port with the understanding and cooperation of the local government…

The crew of bulk carrier Anastasia has debarked in Japan after six months stuck at anchorage off the coast of northern China.The vessel, its coal cargo and mostly Indian crew had been at a standstill since September amid the ongoing COVID-19 crew change crisis and a trade spat including a Chinese ban on Australian coal imports. Anastasia's operator Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), which maintains the Panamanian-flagged vessel and organizes its crew, said the ship's charterer and subcharterer were caught in the resulting political and trade uncertainty as dozens of bulkers were left idled off the Chinese coast for months.Making the problem worse is an international crew change crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic that has left hundreds of thousands of seafarers trapped at sea.

In the murky story of how a cache of highly explosive ammonium nitrate ended up on the Beirut waterfront, one thing is clear—no one has ever publicly come forward to claim it.There are many unanswered questions surrounding last week's huge, deadly blast in the Lebanese capital, but ownership should be among the easiest to resolve.Clear identification of ownership, especially of a cargo as dangerous as that carried by the Moldovan-flagged Rhosus when it sailed into Beirut seven years ago, is fundamental to shipping, the key to insuring it and settling disputes that often arise.But Reuters interviews and trawls for documents across 10 countries in search of the original ownership of this 2…

Iran is using its sea power in the Gulf to show it will not be cowed by Washington's newly assertive Arab allies, prompting critics to accuse Tehran of destabilising the region. Iranian ships fired shots at a Singapore-flagged tanker which it said damaged an Iranian oil platform, causing the vessel to flee, and seized a container ship in the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most important oil route, over a debt row. The incidents coincided with a push by Washington to reassure Gulf Arab monarchies that their interests would not be threatened by a nuclear accord that Tehran and world powers are trying to reach by the end of June. In an escalating confrontation with Saudi Arabia over Yemen…

Iran has released a Marshall-Islands flagged container ship and its crew which were seized last month in one of the world's major oil shipping lanes, the vessel's operator said on Thursday. It confirmed reports from Iran. The vessel was diverted on April 28 by Iranian patrol boats in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran had said the vessel would be let go once a years-old debt case with the ship's charterer Maersk Line was settled. "Rickmers Group is pleased to report today its managed container vessel Maersk Tigris with 24 crew members on board has been officially released by Iranian authorities following an order from the court in Bandar Abbas, Iran," the operator and manager said in a statement. "Earlier Maersk Line put up a security in relation to the underlying court case.

On Saturday July 26, 2014, a ceremony was held in Bergen to officially name the latest new subsea construction vessel to join the Technip fleet, the North Sea Atlantic. More than 200 guests from shipowner North Sea Shipping, ship charterer Technip and supply chain partners, gathered to attend the ceremony held at the NorYards BMV AS shipyard (previously Bergen Group) in Laksevåg, Bergen, Norway. The event was hosted by North Sea Shipping CEO, Hallvard Klepsvik, and his wife, Sigrid Anne Våge, acted as the vessel godmother. Technip announced in 2012 that it had signed a long term charter agreement with North Sea Shipping for an advanced new build construction vessel.

Fred Cheng’s new shipping company, Shinyo International, has purchased the 1998-built 43,000dwt bulk carrier Bara from Louis Dreyfus Armateurs SNC of France. The ship is chartered back to CETRAGPA (Louis Dreyfus) for a period of four years. The transaction marks the first post-Golden Ocean acquisition by Cheng. It also reflects the core industrial shipping approach taken by Cheng over his twenty five years as a shipowner. DVB Nedship Bank provided the mortgage finance for the acquisition out of the bank’s Hong Kong office. The ship will be managed by Univan Ship Management, also of Hong Kong. Dagfinn Lunde, Chairman and CEO of DVB Nedship Bank stated…

To great fanfare, Iñigo Tapias, the new 138,000 cu. m. liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier was launched on January 29 by IZAR's Sestao yard in Bilbao. The ship — standing in testament to the 1,213 workers at Sestao who physically made the ship a reality as well as the underlying strength of the IZAR company — is a highly significant one for many reasons, both technical and business. The 933-ft. (284.4-m), 19.5 knot ship embodies the hopes of a shipbuilding nation that is seeking to re-establish its presence in the LNG niche that it has not occupied for more than three decades, as the production of gas ships generally lays in the hands of Far East builders today.

Bob Fitzgerald, founder of Bunkerfuels, will join OceanConnect's senior management team, effective April 15, 2002. Fitzgerald, who founded Bunkerfuels Corporation in 1978 and quickly led it to a world leadership position, sold the company in 1999, when Bunkerfuels handled over 10 million tons of marine fuel inquiries and closed approximately 6.5 million tons from office locations in the United States, Korea, England and Brazil. Fitzgerald's experience also includes 11 years of service in Chevron's production, drilling and bunker divisions and eight years as manager of the bunker department for ship charterer Charles R. Weber Company.

An online shipping exchange being set up by two of the world's biggest oil firms, a leading agrifood multinational and top shipbroker will transform the way traditional shipping markets work, industry experts said. The company, LevelSeas.Com, being set up by oil majors BP Amoco and Shell International Trading and Shipping with food processor and distributor Cargill and shipbroker Clarksons will potentially control 10 percent of bulk commodity movements from day one. But it aims to be a neutral platform open to all sides of the industry. "This will act as a real catalyst for change in the industry - and change for the better. Nothing else offers a seamless service to take us from the start to the end of a voyage…