CONTSHIP, SCI, CMA CGM START U.S./INDIA LINK AHEAD OF SCHEDULE
Contship Containerlines, the Shipping Corp. of India and CMA CGM have started their joint direct weekly U.S. East Coast/Indian subcontinent service ahead of schedule. The service was originally supposed to start in mid-July.
The Indamex service is provided by eight ships of about 1,000 TEUs capacity. Contship provides three ships and CMA and CGM provide the remaining five ships between them.
The rotation is Nhava Sheva, New York, Norfolk, Charleston, Gioia Tauro, Port Said, Jeddah and Colombo. The carriers have not decided yet whether Charleston or Savannah will be the service's third U.S. call.
The direct transit time of 21 days between India and the U.S. East Coast marks the fastest service in the trade, said David Halliday, chief executive officer of Contship.
Comparative transit times, service frequencies and vessel rotation details of all liner services in the U.S./India trade are posted on ComPairData, the global shipping database, at http://www.compairdata.com