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SONAR Sightings for July 5: Rejection rates out of Savannah, Georgia, climb despite volume decrease from holiday

The highlights from Tuesday’s SONAR reports are below. For more information on SONAR — the fastest freight-forecasting platform in the industry — or to request a demo, click here. Also, be sure to check out the latest SONAR update, TRAC — the freshest spot rate data in the industry.

Market watch

Savannah, Georgia, is home to the fourth largest port behind Los Angeles, Long Beach and New York/New Jersey, and currently owns 7.1% of import market share.

As the West Coast ports in California experience congestion and a possible strike, the ports on the East Coast will be eager to catch the extra freight in order to increase their market share.

Overall import volume of twenty-foot equivalents (TEUs) to the port of Savannah are 37% less than six months ago, with its import market share dropping almost one whole percentage point.


SONAR Tickers: PIMS.USNYC, PIMS.USLAX, PIMS.USLGB, PIMS.USSAV

On land, Savannah’s Outbound Tender Volume Index was on the rise leading up to the Fourth of July holiday and will begin to catch up to those levels in the coming days. 

Outbound rejections remained consistently above 12% through the holiday and are currently at 12.8%, signifying that freight is hitting the spot market and this tightening in capacity will begin to push rates upward.

SONAR Tickers: OTRI.SAV, OTRI.MDT

Watch: Carrier update


NTI as a point of reference

The National Truckload Index is a daily look at how spot rates in specific lanes hold up in comparison to the national average, giving carriers and brokers an idea of which lanes to gravitate toward or avoid.

NTI Daily

Lane to watch: Savannah to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Spot market rates in this lane have decreased 21 cents in the last month alone but still remain at 57 cents above the current national average.


Tender rejections out of Savannah remain at 12.8%, signifying capacity is still tight as expected around the Fourth of July holiday.

The Outbound Tender Volume Index for Harrisburg was consistently above 350 before the holiday. Rejections within the market are currently at 11.5% and climbing, creating a plausible scenario of carriers being able to book a load to come out once they arrive in Harrisburg.

Tightening capacity in Harrisburg, as evidenced by the upward trend in rejections, will put upward pressure on spot market rates, allowing for carriers to push rates in their favor.

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Corey Smith

Corey is a staff writer for FreightWaves with experience in air, intermodal and parcel operations, as well as LTL and full truckload transportation management. He is a graduate of the University of Memphis, majoring in supply chain management, and enjoys basketball, cinema and traveling.