First-ever direct service from South East India to North Europe starts voyaging from Vizag

November 27, 2019: Visakha Container Terminal at Vizag port announced that they have operated the first-ever direct service from South East India to North Europe (IEX) which also connects the Mediterranean region. The vessel M.V.E R Sweden operated by Cosco shipping started the maiden voyage from the terminal on November 15, 2019.

The first-ever Direct Europe Service made its maiden voyage from the port city, Visakhapatnam at 1550 hours IST on November 15, 2019.#VCT #Vizag #MaidenMovement #EXIm #Vaartha #Visakhapatnam #Cosco #ONE #YML #OOCL #HapagLloyd #JMBAXIGROUP pic.twitter.com/vBuI6KgMC6

— Visakha Container Terminal (@TerminalVisakha) November 27, 2019

IEX service consortium formed in July this year, composing of 9 vessels of 6,500 TEU capacity, is jointly operated by Yang Ming, COSCO SHIPPING Lines, Hapag-Lloyd, Ocean Network Express (ONE), and OOCL. The fixed-weekly service starts from Vizag and turn around back at Vizag making it the first port of call for the new service.

The rotation will be as follows:

Visakhapatnam – Krishnapatnam – Chennai – Tuticorin – Colombo – Cochin – Damietta – Piraeus – Rotterdam – London Gateway Port – Hamburg – Antwerp – Le Havre – Damietta – Jeddah – Colombo – Visakhapatnam.

This new service is expected to be a gateway to the trade for direct shipments reducing the transit time that would, in turn, create room for more container traffic from/to Visakhapatnam.