There is a pileup in California, not from street traffic, but instead from the numerous ships at the ports in Los Angeles and Long Beach.
On Wednesday January 13th, there were 91 ships at the LA port. Of those, 56 of them were container ships with 24 at berth and 32 at anchor. Typically, there are only about a dozen ship at the port at one time and they are not usually container ships.
In 2015, during a labor dispute, there were 28 container ships at anchor in Los Angeles. The record level number of ships at anchor this week has surpassed it’s most recent comparable.
Ships have filled all usable anchorages off Los Angeles and Long Beach this week and have moved south filling six of the 10 contingency anchorages off Huntington.
In addition to the traffic jam, labor shortages and high import volumes, have caused vessel wait times to shoot up to 10-14 days. The port of Los Angeles predicts imports to continue to increase as well, from 143,776 TEUs this week to 157,763 TEUs next week, and to 182,953 TEUs the week of Jan. 24-30.
Equipment availability is extremely limited as well. Average terminal dwell for 20ft container chassis is 10 days and 5 days for 40/45ft chassis. Street dwell times are now up to averages of nearly 10 days for 20ft chassis and nearly 8 days for 40/45ft chassis.
Stay up-to-date on freight news by following us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. For continuous updates, make sure to check out our website at greenworldwide.com.
