The drop is ascribed to longer than usual Lunar New Year shutdowns of factories in China, in what is usually a slow season, amid measures aimed at curbing the spread of the virus. As a result, imports at major U.S. retail container ports have decreased substantially.
In order to address the lower demand, carriers have employed capacity management measures in the form of blanked sailings.
In weeks 5-15 of 2020, carriers have voided a total of 111 sailings on the Transpacific, of which 48 were blanked due to COVID-19, and the remainder due to “normal” Chinese New Year capacity management, according to the data from Sea Intelligence.
