ContainersEuropeOperations
Giant Cosco boxship refloated off Antwerp
Cosco Shipping’s 14,000 teu containership CSCL Jupiter, which ran aground on the Scheldt Estuary off Bath near Antwerp Port yesterday, has been successfully refloated.
An initial attempt to refloat the vessel failed yesterday morning, however last night around 8:30pm a second attempt was made utilising a dozen tugs and the vessel was refloated a little over 30 minutes later.
The ship has returned to Antwerp Port and been unloaded while inspections take place.
Port operations at Antwerp, one of the busiest box ports in northern Europe, have returned to normal.
And again, we are lucky and happy to see that this grounded ULCC could be removed, using the combined force and skills of 12 tugs. Yet again, we have to work harder to make our waterways safer and improve our emergency response systems to deal with such incidents all around the clobe. Ports and their access channels need to be compared with airports and develop comparable emergency response place in advance of a disaster happening.
Cosco while it says in big letters China Shipping on her hull.
In 2015, Cosco merged with China Shipping — repainting that big green hull would be a tad pricey, Alexander