M

[Dave van Spronsen]

A P M

[pepper_220]

How many classes of container ships which maersk still using now ?

[kyle pesely]

it was only a matter of time before they sold. given their age, they seemed to be on borrowed time anyway. im sure they'll get a haphazard paint job in the MSC colors that wont ever be maintained and eventually end up trading with MSC India or some other second hand MSC subsidiary, before they end up dying on the beaches of Alang or Karachi. lets start taking bets: i say 3 years. any takers?

kyle

[Joe Becker]

Very interesting. I was wondering why Marie Maersk was laying portside for 5 days in Newark NJ (12/7 thru 12/12). I saw Majestic Maersk in June. She was looking anything but Majestic.

[tonymar]

selling your ships to your main competitor seems strange

[Krispen Atkinson]

Not really that strange when you look at it - let's face it, the old M types even though impressive when delivered do not really fit into the Maersk schedule nowadays (this is why Maersk released them on time charter to MSC), and are 20 years old - instead of flogging them off to a Greek or German tramp owner who may have paid 75-80% of the market value of the vessels, MSC have probably paid a very reasonable price for the vessels to secure them. At the end of the day, if Maersk sold these to tramp owners, I'm sure the intelligent management at Maersk would realise that these would fall into the hands of their prime competitors on time charter so why not take full potential and sell them to them to a main competior and get the best possible price - let's face it, with Maersk's profits, it's just a small drop in the ocean with 18,000 TEU's on their way!

[kyle pesely]

from my understanding, theyve already been under charter to MSC for awhile now. along with a few of the B-Boats, and i believe a few of the b class are now wholly owned by MSC.

[Krispen Atkinson]

Yes, the M types have been on time charter to MSC for a while now, hence the dropping of the 'Maersk' part of the names - strangely though they remained in Maersk colours - presume this will now change following this week's news.
The Volkswerft built 'B types' (VW 5000 types) are still owned by Maersk (some owned through finance companies), though 5 of the 8 are on time charter to MSC - these 5 have all have dropped the Maersk prefix for the charter (Baltimore, Boston, Bentonville, Beaumont, Brooklyn) and all operate on the MSC cheetah's service - I would very much doubt Maersk would be selling these to competitors any day soon, due to their very high and superior specification which could be an advantage in the future!

[Andrew McAlpine]

Krispen is quite right, Although Maersk don't often sell vessel's to their competitors but then in these hard times shipping lines have started to cooperate in lots of different ways.  

I for one hope these vessels keep sailing for MSC for some time as they are nice looking vessels although Majestic could do with a new paint job!

Regards
Andrew
Containership Admin

[kyle pesely]

@Krispen:

i remember reading about the sale/lease-back to the Swedish finance company a while back and must have confused that with the charter to MSC. my apologies.

@Andrew:

now, dont get me wrong. i, too, would like to see them continue on, as they seem to have lots of life left under all the rust! it would be nice to see MSC give them a good overhaul and perhaps keep a small connection to their past and simply add "MSC" to their names. these M-class boats do have a certain sophistication in their lines. i would just hate to see them become a victim of deferred maintenance and rapidly decline to a point of no return. that would be a shame.

on a side note, do we know why these boats stayed on the Danish register for so long? the going practice seems to dictate that as boats get older, they get moved over to Panamanian or Singaporean registry or something similar to save costs and allow for cheaper crewing. did APM have a plan in keeping them there, or was there just a Maersk corporate officer who was fond of them and insisted they stay there?

just curious.

kyle

[Magogman]

Does anyone have names for the 3 ships?  Thanks.

[kyle pesely]

Marie EX-Marie Maersk. IMO: 8715869

Majestic, EX-Majestic Maersk. IMO: 8715857

Magleby, EX-Magleby Maersk. IMO: 8715871


kyle

[spotti]

Magleby Maersk still in Maersk schedules. It will terminate its Maersk career
as a feeder on two round trips from Bremerhaven to Gothenburg and Aarhus. A
sad ending for this old lady.
As far as I recall MSC has been a steady buyer of Maersk rust buckets over the
years, including some of the former SeaLand ships. So maybe the M in MSC just
means Maersk 
However, also a close cooperation between the two companies on several strings
lately, so the solution is apparently to stay close to your competitors.

Niels