According to The California Trucking Association (CTA) and the United States Port Trucking Association (HTA), the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, 10,000 to 15,000 containers were stranded at the terminals, causing the cargo transportation of these two major ports to"nearly paralyze." In addition, West Coast ports and Chicago are also at a loss for the large number of empty containers brought about by the surgein imports.The Long Beach Port and the Los Angeles Port are the two busiest ports in the United States. Thes etwo ports achieved double-digit year-on-year throughput growth in October, both setting historical records. It is reported that the container throughput of Long Beach Port in October was 806,603 TEUs, a year-on-year increase of 17.2%,breaking the historical record set a month ago."We are optimistic about the gradual recovery of the economy, and we are also prepared to deal with any shocks." Long Beach Port said. The growth of e-Commerce business,retailers continue to prepare for the holiday shopping season, the increased demand for gardening equipment, pet supplies and musical instruments are the main factors affecting the growth of Long Beach Port’s cargo volume.With the continued popularity of China-US routes, strong growth in freight volume, influx of large amounts of cargo, and continuous rebound in freight volume, the Port of Los Angeles in the United States is experiencing unprecedented busyness and congestion.In fact, since August, the performance ofthe Port of Los Angeles began to grow strongly. Los Angeles reported that the freight rate of containers passing through the port increased by 30%.In September, the Port of Los Angeles handled 97 ships, including 11 unscheduled voyages. The number of containers increased by 13% to 883,625 TEUs.The total for the quarter exceeded 2.7 million TEUs.So far, the shipping company temporarily increased a total of 31 unplanned voyages to the Port of Los Angeles. On average, each container ship has tohandle more than 10,000 TEUs.Gene Seroka,executive director of the Port of Los Angeles, said that the current Los Angeles port yard is full of containers filled with cargo, and port workers are working overtime to handle the containers. In order to reduce the spread of the virus, the port has temporarily reduced the number of dockers and portpersonnel by about one-third, which is difficult to supplement in time, which means that the loading and unloading of ships will be greatly affected.At the same time,there is a general shortage of equipment in ports, extended loading andunloading time, coupled with the serious container imbalance in Pacific trade,causing a large number of imported containers to be backlogged in US ports,terminal congestion, and container turnover, which hinders cargotransportation.Gene Seroka said: "The Port of LosAngeles is currently experiencing a large number of ships entering the port.Unscheduled ships calling at the port have brought us very difficult problems.The port is very congested, and the arrival time of ships may beaffected."Shipping companies have successively issued notices of delaysFor the congestion at the Port of Los Angeles, Maersk announced that it would impose a congestion fee.The problem has not been effectively improved, but it has become more and more intense."Although cargo owners and truck drivers cannot return empty containers or take away imported containers, they still have to pay millions of dollars in detention and detention fees." CTA and the HTA called for an immediate stop to the collection of related fees.In this regard, Maersk is planning to cooperate with HTA. The two parties will hold communication meetings to improve the efficiency of Maersk Terminal'slocal business operations and solve congestion problems.Some agencies predict that the congestionin US ports will continue until the first quarter of 2021, because the demand for cargo is still highAn American freight forwarder said:"What we have heard is that the situation will only get worse. The weather will be delayed, there will be no berthing windows, and there will be more large sweeping ships entering the port. Ships are not unloaded fast enough, andreliability is getting worse, putting pressure on the entire supply chain."Moreover, bigger and more delays have just begun!!It coincides withthe Thanksgiving holiday, the next end delivery will also be suspended orpostponed, UPS and FedEX have issued notifications
