Containerized shipments moving from Asia to the United States Midwest through Prince Rupert, British Columbia, almost tripled in the third quarter from the previous two quarters -- its first full year of container operations.
The Prince Rupert Port Authority reported today that 59,220 TEUs were handled in the three months ending Sept. 30, compared with 22,515 TEUs in the second quarter and 21,040 TEUs in the third quarter.
The cumulative total of 102,775 TEUs still is far off Fairview Container Terminal’s 500,000-TEU annual capacity, but is steadily growing.
The third quarter increase comes on a second service instituted last July by the Cosco-CKYH Alliance, with five ships ranging from 7,400 TEUs to 8,200 TEUs on the weekly North China-U.S. Southwest Express (CEN) service.
Prince Rupert opened container operations in September, 2007 with service from South China by the Alliance with smaller ships in a still-operating Pacific North West Service (PNWS).
So far, 50 Alliance vessels from Cosco Container Lines., "K" Line, Hanjin Shipping and Yang Ming Line have called the terminal, with 62,365 TEUs offloaded for North America, and 40,423 TEUs loaded for export. The authority said 33.6 percent of containers for export were fully loaded.
The port's containerized cargo totaled 1.03 million metric tons in the third quarter, offsetting a 28-percent drop in grain shipments due to low Canadian stocks.
Overall, the port handled 7.7 million tons of cargo through the third quarter, a slight increase of 70,000 tons over the 2007 period.
Container export volumes include growing numbers of forest products and Western Canadian petrochemicals, the authority said.
The Prince Rupert Port Authority reported today that 59,220 TEUs were handled in the three months ending Sept. 30, compared with 22,515 TEUs in the second quarter and 21,040 TEUs in the third quarter.
The cumulative total of 102,775 TEUs still is far off Fairview Container Terminal’s 500,000-TEU annual capacity, but is steadily growing.
The third quarter increase comes on a second service instituted last July by the Cosco-CKYH Alliance, with five ships ranging from 7,400 TEUs to 8,200 TEUs on the weekly North China-U.S. Southwest Express (CEN) service.
Prince Rupert opened container operations in September, 2007 with service from South China by the Alliance with smaller ships in a still-operating Pacific North West Service (PNWS).
So far, 50 Alliance vessels from Cosco Container Lines., "K" Line, Hanjin Shipping and Yang Ming Line have called the terminal, with 62,365 TEUs offloaded for North America, and 40,423 TEUs loaded for export. The authority said 33.6 percent of containers for export were fully loaded.
The port's containerized cargo totaled 1.03 million metric tons in the third quarter, offsetting a 28-percent drop in grain shipments due to low Canadian stocks.
Overall, the port handled 7.7 million tons of cargo through the third quarter, a slight increase of 70,000 tons over the 2007 period.
Container export volumes include growing numbers of forest products and Western Canadian petrochemicals, the authority said.