Two more major shipping firms, Mediterranean Shipping Company and CMA CGM, said on Saturday they were suspending passage through a Red Sea strait vital for global trade.
The announcement by Italian-Swiss giant MSC and France’s CMA CGM follows a similar decision on Friday by two of the world’s largest shipping companies, Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd.
The CMA CGM Group announced that it is deeply concerned about the recent attacks on commercial vessels unfolding in the Red Sea Region. We have been taking over the past days increasing prevention measures to ensure the safety of our vessels and their crews navigating these waters. The situation is further deteriorating and concern of safety is increasing.
As such we have decided to instruct all CMA CGM containerships in the area that are scheduled to pass through the Red Sea to reach safe areas and pause their journey in safe waters with immediate effect until further notice.
CMA CGM is taking all necessary steps to preserve its transportation services for its customers, the announcement concluded.
On a similar note, on 15 December, the container ship MSC PALATIUM III was attacked at approximately 09.37 UTC while transiting the Red Sea under sub charter to Messina Line. All crew are safe with no reported injuries, meanwhile the vessel suffered limited fire damage and has been taken out of service.
Due to this incident and to protect the lives and safety of our seafarers, until the Red Sea passage is safe, MSC ships will not transit the Suez Canal Eastbound and Westbound. Already now, some services will be rerouted to go via the Cape of Good Hope instead.
This disruption will impact the sailing schedules by several days of vessels booked for Suez transit. We ask for your understanding under these serious circumstances; MSC announcement concluded.
