Maruba News

Maritime research company, Drewry, said in this week’s container insight report that it is not just on the East-West routes that big container lines are consolidating, but consortia have also been expanding in North-South tradelanes, thereby reducing the number of weekly services available to shippers. Hapag-Lloyd’s recent reduction in the number of weekly services offered to customers between Northern Europe and the East Coast of South America through slot charters is just another step towards carrier and joint service consolidation in the North-South trades.

Inchcape Shipping Services appoints new General Manager for Brazil, Capt. Mariano Martinoia. Capt. Martinoia will be based in Rio de Janeiro, at the company’s head office for Brazil. He will be responsible for managing ISS’ nine Brazilian offices which cover all the country’s ports. A graduate of the Argentinean Merchant Navy, Mariano served as Captain for 10 years. His experience includes working for Maruba Line as an operator developing regional expertise in USA, the Orient and South America in the handling of container, breakbulk cargoes and bulk carriers. Mariano also has experience in boat operations when he served on the gas supply platform, Merluzaat Shell for Tidewater.

CMA CGM, Maruba and Hapag-Lloyd are collaborating in a regular weekly service between Northern Europe and the east coast of South America. On 11 August 2009, the CMA CGM Volet became the first ship of the new joint service to visit the Port of Hamburg. Built in 2006 at South Korea’s Hyundai Mipo dockyard, the container ship of the French shipping company CMA CGM is 222 metres long, 98.4 ft wide and has a slot capacity of 2,800 TEUs as well as 590 refrigerated container connections. When fully loaded (39,400 dwt) the ship has a maximum draught of 39.4 ft.

On the first trip of the new South America service SAFRAN, the CMA CGM Violet put in to Hamburg on 03 December 2008. Loading and unloading was carried out at the Container Terminal Burchardkai (CTB) of Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG (HHLA). Built in 2006 at South Korea's Hyundai Mipo dockyard, the French shipping company's container vessel is 222 metres in length and 30 metres wide, and has a container slot capacity of 2800 TEU as well as 590 reefer connections. When fully loaded (39,400 DWT), the ship reaches a maximum draught of 12 metres.

Hapag-Lloyd will launch a new service called WSX in July to serve the market between Asia, South and . The new WSX service has been designed to meet Hapag Lloyd’s existing and future customer requirements for a direct fixed day service between the two continents. Operating fortnightly, the WSX service will link Asia to , , and on the following rotation: – – – Shekou – Port Kelang – – Tema – – – – Port Kelang – . The service will deploy five ships with capacities ranging between 2,000 and 2,500 TEU with adequate reefer plugs. Hapag-Lloyd will deploy one vessel in the service which will be jointly operated with partners China Shipping and Maruba Lines. The first departure will be from on July 15th.

Tomas Marutz and Dr. Walter Klausmann (both CEOs of HDW-Gaarden), the godmother Georgina H. Rodriguez and her husband Gustavo Rodriguez (CEO and president of the Maruba Group), Helmut Ponath (CEO and President of NSB Niederelbe Schiffahrtsgesellschaft mbH & Co. On September 8, the first of a series of five 2,700 TEU container ships was launched and christened Marupa Europa in Kiel at HDW-Gaarden – a company of ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems. The launch was performed by Georgina H. Rodriguez, CEO and president of the Maruba Group. mbH & Co. KG, Buxtehude. The ship had already been handed over to the shipping line the day before. Upon request of the shipping line, the ship was handed over earlier than scheduled. The remaining four ships will be delivered by the end of 2008.