The world’s largest container vessel MOL Triumph owned by Japanese shipping line Mitsui O.S.K Lines, Ltd. (MOL) called at Hongkong International Terminals (HIT) last Saturday during its maiden voyage, informs the terminal.
MOL Triumph has a capacity of 20,170 TEU and is the first ever containership exceeding the 20,000 TEU capacity limit. It is 400m long and 58.8m wide. As we wrote earlier, MOL informs that the vessel can be converted to run on LNG fuel, as soon as LNG supply is commercially available.
It is the first of six 20,000 TEU-class container vessels that Samsung Heavy Industries Co., Ltd. is currently building for MOL. MOL Triumph will be deployed in Asia-Europe trade via THE Alliance’s FE2 service.
Delivered to MOL on March 27, it started its maiden voyage on April 04 by departing from Tianjin Xingang. Afterwards, MOL Triumph called at Dalian, Qingdao, Shanghai and Ningbo before arriving in Hong Kong on April 15 at 2.30am.
HIT’s Managing Director, Gerry Yim, said at the ceremony celebrating the call of MOL Triumph: “The fact that the world’s largest container vessel called at HIT on her maiden voyage signifies Hong Kong’s prominence in the global maritime industry. At the same time, it reflects MOL’s confidence in HIT’s capabilities and efficiency.”
Gerry Yim has also commented that after Hong Kong completed the dredging of its channel to 17m, HIT is now capable of serving three mega vessels simultaneously at its facilities.
The HKD 490 mln (about USD 63 mln) project by the government to deepen the Kwai Tsing container basin and its approach channel began in 2013 and was completed last year.
Mr. Yim also highlighted that the increased capability was possible thanks to the co-management scheme for the 16 berths in Terminals 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9 at Kwai Tsing Container Port. It may be reminded that last December COSCO Shipping Ports Limited and Hutchison Port Holdings Trust entered into an agreement to jointly manage 3 terminal operating companies in the port of Hong Kong.
At 5pm the same afternoon, after a 14-hour stop, MOL Triumph set off for the port of Yantian, from where it will sail to Singapore, and onwards through the Suez Canal to Tangier, Southampton, Hamburg, Rotterdam and Le Havre. It will return to Hong Kong on the way back to Tianjin Xingang.
However, MOL Triumph’s status of the largest containership in the world has been short-lived. On April 11, the 20,568-TEU Madrid Maersk was delivered. Constructed by another Korean shipbuilder – Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering – the vessel is also 400m long and 60m wide but its hull has been deepened to allow for an extra tier of containers in the hold. Madrid Maersk is the first of Maersk’s EEE Mark II class of new generation mega containerships. Maersk ordered 11 of these vessels in 2015 for delivery in 2017-2018.
But Madrid Maersk is also expected to be surpassed shortly, by the next record-breaker – the 21,100 TEU OOCL Hong Kong, which will be delivered from Samsung Heavy Industries in November 2017.