APL Vanda Mystery Solved Amid Delays

The incident surrounding the mystery ship – APL Vanda – has been uncovered, but the length of delay for the arrival of UK containers has become the latest mystery.

Last week the vessel was idling off the coast of Djibouti, after an unexplained incident on 3rd July. Steamship lines were initially tight-lipped about what problems had been encountered during its voyage.

It later turned out that during a storm, 55 containers had been lost overboard and a further 36 were damaged. The vessel has subsequently been in the Port of Djibouti having the damaged containers removed.

Our current understanding is that when this is complete, the vessel will not be heading to Southampton as the call has now been omitted.

Instead, the vessel will travel to Tangier port in Morocco, where the UK bound containers will be removed and transhipped to another vessel for onforwarding to the UK.

The vessel was originally due to arrive in Southampton on 17th July, and at this stage it is very difficult to see UK cargo arriving before the end of this month.

We will continue to monitor the situation closely and as the plot thickens.