G6, OOCL void October Asia-Europe voyages

In addition to skipped sailings in the transpacific trade, the G6 Alliance will void one sailing each on its Loop 5 and Loop 7 services between Asia and North Europe and member OOCL will skip another on its EMX loop between Asia and the Mediterranean.    The G6 Alliance in October will void one sailing each on its Loop 5 and Loop 7 services between Asia and North Europe and alliance member Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL) will skip another on its EMX loop between Asia and the Mediterranean, according to a statement from the carrier.
   The news comes after the ocean carrier alliance said it would skip sailings in October on its transpacific Central China 4 (CC4) and South China 2 (SC2) services, which connect Asia with the United States West Coast.
   OOCL said the G6 Alliance, which also includes Hapag-Lloyd, APL, Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM), Mitsui O.S.K. Line (MOL) and Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK), will skip the Sept. 30 sailing of the OOCL France from Kwangyang on Loop 5 and the Oct. 10 sailing of the APL Raffles from Qingdao on Loop 7.
   According to ocean carrier schedule and capacity database BlueWater Reporting, Loop 5 loop operates with 11 vessels, four from OOCL, three each from HMM and Hapag-Lloyd, and one from APL, with an average capacity of 13,191 TEUs. The service has a full port rotation of Gwangyang, Busan, Shanghai, Ningbo, Kaohsiung, Yantian, Singapore, Le Havre, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Southampton, Singapore, Kaohsiung and Gwangyang.
   Loop 7 operates with 12 ships, four each from MOL and APL, three from Hapag-Lloyd, and one from NYK, with an average capacity of 13,726 TEUs, and a full port rotation of Qingdao, Shanghai, Ningbo, Hong Kong, Yantian, Singapore, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Gdansk, Gothenburg, Antwerp, Southampton, Singapore, Yantian and Qingdao.
   In addition, OOCL will skip the Oct. 7 sailing of the ZIM Genova from Busan on its joint EMX loop with ZIM, which connects Asia with the Mediterranean.
   The EMX service operates with 10 vessels, eight from ZIM and two from OOCL, with an average capacity of 4,264 TEUs. The loop has a full port rotation of Busan, Shanghai, Ningbo, Da Chan Bay, Ashdod, Haifa, Istanbul (Ambarli), Novorossiysk, Odessa, Istanbul (Ambarli), Haifa, Mumbai, Port Kelang, Da Chan Bay and Busan.
   OOCL said the skipped sailings are in response to “expected low demand in October.”
   In addition to Loop 5 and Loop 7, the G6 Alliance currently operates two services between Asia and North Europe: the 11-ship 9,390-TEU average Loop 1 and the 12-ship 13,393-TEU average Loop 4, on which CMA CGM and subsidiary ANL purchase slots.
   OOCL participates on two other services aside from the EMX that connect Asia with the Mediterranean: the G6 Alliance’s EUM/MED, which operates with ten ships with an average capacity of 11,601 TEUs, and the alliance’s 11-ship 6,673-TEU average Asia Suez Express (AZX), on which CMA CGM and ZIM take slots.