The South Carolina Ports Authority (SC Ports) has eliminated the backlog of container ships that numbered between 15 and 20 just a few weeks ago, but says it is likely some inbound vessels will have to sit at anchor over the next few months because Charleston\u2019s Wando Welch Terminal will be operating with two berths instead of three through November owing to construction work.<\/p>\n
The port was able to clear all the recently anchored vessels, helped by a temporary reopening of all Wando Welch\u2019s berths last week amid a 10-day pause in the project work.<\/p>\n
Construction work will resume July 15, again taking down a berth at Wando, but a port spokesperson said any delays will be minimal until August due to the nature of the work. Next month, customers should expect 48-hour delays getting into the port; those delays could extend into September and October depending on import volumes and progress made on the full opening of the Hugh K. Leatherman marine terminal.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur SC Ports team and maritime partners are working together to ensure fluidity for our customers amid this critical infrastructure project,\u201d SC Ports CEO Barbara Melvin said in a statement to the Journal of Commerce.<\/p>\n
The project work involves the construction of something called a toe wall, a structure that is necessary to retain the inner harbor depth at 54 feet to accommodate ultra-large container vessels. The work includes installing steel sheets along the wharf that act as a barrier to prevent sediment and soil from accumulating in the harbor and reducing the channel depth.<\/p>\n
SC Ports also said it is in close communication with ocean carriers and customers about the progress of the toe wall work to ensure there is no \u201cping-pong\u201d effect in which ocean carriers drop Charleston cargo into Savannah to avoid any potential delays.<\/p>\n
During the pandemic, ocean carriers skipped Savannah to avoid delays and dropped Savannah-bound cargo in Charleston. The trucking community could not handle the longer drays and the result was that the delays shifted from Savannah to Charleston. SC Ports CEO Barbara Melvin has previously said she does not believe such a \u201cping-pong\u201d effect will happen again because terminal operations are fluid in Charleston.<\/p>\n
Leatherman, meanwhile, will reopen before the end of the year, according to port officials, but an official date has not been announced. If it happens before the work at Wando Welch is completed, it would put Charleston back at three operating berths again capable of handling ultra-large container vessels.<\/p>\n
Source:<\/p>\n
Ashe, A. (2024, July 9). Charleston clears vessel backlog, but expects some delays through November<\/i>. Journal of Commerce. https:\/\/www.joc.com\/article\/charleston-clears-vessel-backlog-expects-some-delays-through-november_20240709.html<\/p>\n The South Carolina Ports Authority (SC Ports) has eliminated the backlog of container ships that numbered between 15 and 20 just a few weeks ago, but says it is likely some inbound vessels will have to sit at anchor over the next few months because Charleston\u2019s Wando Welch Terminal will be operating with two berths …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[84,83],"class_list":["post-3014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-maritime","tag-us-ports"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3014"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3015,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3014\/revisions\/3015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}