Containers caught fire on board the Hapag Lloyd's boxship Yantian Express

German shipping company Hapag Lloyd reports that on 3 January, a fire broke out in one container on the deck of the Yantian Express and spread to additional containers and that the crew of 8 officers and 15 seafarers is unharmed.

Efforts to extinguish the fire in the containers were launched immediately but have had to be suspended for the time being due to a significant deterioration of weather conditions.

The 7,510 TEU vessel, which is 320 meters long and sails under German flag in the East Coast Loop 5 (EC5) service, was built in 2002 and was on its way from Colombo to Halifax via the Suez Canal. At present, the ship is approximately 650 nautical miles off the coast of Canada.

It is still too early to make a precise estimate of any damage to the vessel or its cargo. Hapag-Lloyd is closely cooperating with all relevant authorities.

About Hapag-Lloyd
With a fleet of 222 modern container ships and a total transport capacity of 1.6 million TEU, Hapag-Lloyd is one of the world’s leading liner shipping companies. The Company has around 12,000 employees and 394 offices in 127 countries. Hapag-Lloyd has a container capacity of 2.6 million TEU – including one of the largest and most modern fleets of reefer containers. A total of 120 liner services worldwide ensure fast and reliable connections between more than 600 ports on all the continents. Hapag-Lloyd is one of the leading operators in the Transatlantic, Middle East, Latin America and Intra-America trades