Nedlloyd's pioneering hatchcoverless containerships to be scrapped

THREE pioneering hatchcoverless containerships built for former Dutch container shipping line Royal Nedlloyd (Nedlloyd Line) in the 1990s are to be scrapped in India.

The three ships to be scrapped are the 4,181 TEU, 1995-built Nedlloyd Honshu and Maersk Miami (ex Nedlloyd Hong Kong) and the 3,604 TEU, 1992-built Nedlloyd Oceania.

They belong to two different series of innovative hatchcoverless container vessels that were built by Japan's IHI shipyard in Kure and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) in Kobe, reports Alphaliner.

A further five 3,604 TEU units, known as the "Ultimate Container Carriers", were delivered in 1991 and 1992. Two larger vessels of 4,181 TEU were delivered in 1994 and 1995 respectively. 

These hatchcoverless ships ended up in the Maersk network when the APM-Maersk Group took over P&O Nedlloyd in 2005. The current managers of the vessels are Blue Star Holding, a company formed after the shipmanagement activities of Reederei Blue Star were combined with those of ER Schiffahrt in July 2012.

The hatchcoverless design enables containers above deck to be stowed directly into the cell guides and therefore do not need any lashing, improving the safety of containers at sea.

But the concept failed to gain widespread acceptance due to a number of drawbacks and has since been abandoned. 

One drawback concerned the stack heights, with the bottom container having to support the weight of up to 12 boxes stacked onto it, creating an additional constraint in stowage plans to avoid overloading bottom containers.