[170816.EN.SEA] MSC Sofia Celeste First Neopanamax To Sail To London's Tilbury Dock

THE first neopanamax vessel to call at London Container Terminal (LCT) at London's Tilbury Dock

There the Mediterranean Shipping Company's (MSC) 8,819-TEU Sofia Celeste tied up after transiting the expanded Panama Canal for the first time deployed on a service linking the west coast of South America to the east coast of North America and northwest Europe.

The Port of Tilbury is London's biggest port serving a market of 18 million people living within 120 kilometres. The LCT is the UK's largest reefer terminal, which came in handy given the 2014-dottage Sofia Celeste can carry 1,462 TEU reefers.

"The MSC Sofia Celeste marks a change for Tilbury's customers offering much improved links to the growing South American and transatlantic market, said LCT chief commercial officer Ross McKissock.

According to MSC's commercial import general manager Natasha Griffin, the shipping line aims to further develop services of this kind in future.

The Sofia Celeste is the first to be deployed on MSC's new South America west coast-US-northwest continent service, which also visits ports in Chile, Peru, Ecuador, the Bahamas, Philadelphia and then Rotterdam.

Tilbury handles a wide range of cargo with specialist expertise in paper and forest products, containers and ro-ro, grain and bulk commodities, and construction and building materials.

Source : SN-TR.