South Korea's Hanjin Shipping has sold 13 containerships - even 5,302 TEU and six 4,024 TEUers built between 1996 and 1998 - for scrap on the breaker beaches of India.
Most vessels were from the transpacific service, with the smaller ships deployed on Far East-US east coast strings via the Panama canal while the overpanamaxes were deployed on Far East-US west coast services, reported Alphaliner.
It said the ships are currently being phased into Far East-India rotations, for final delivery to the scrap buyers. The first scrapped unit, the Hanjin Shanghai, arrived in Alang on January 31. It will be followed by the other axed ships over the next few months.
The vessels for disposal had been transferred four years ago to Korea Asset Management Company (KAMCO) under a government sponsored rescue package.
KAMCO had taken these ships from the shipping line under a sale-and-leaseback deal in July 2009 to ease its short-term cash burden. The scheme was devised to prevent large chunks of its fleet from being sold to foreign buyers at distressed prices.
Hanjin will take delivery of new 10,000 TEU ships chartered from Seaspan starting from March. They are expected to be deployed on its transpacific services to replace smaller vessels.
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