Alternate Shipping Route Prepped Near Baltimore Bridge Collapse Site
A cleanup and recovery team at the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore is prepping to create an alternate channel to enable commercial essential vessels to access the city’s port.
According to a Sunday note from the U.S. Coast Guard-led Unified Command response team, the action is part of a phased approach to opening the main channel. The temporary channel will be marked with navigation lights and will be 11-feet deep with a 264-foot horizontal clearance, and vertical clearance of 96 feet. A tugboat pushing a fuel barge headed for Delaware’s Dover Air Force Base became the first vessel to bypass the wreckage on Monday.
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An alternate channel will be necessary for the Port of Baltimore to fully reopen, as container vessels are currently blocked by the bridge’s wreckage in the Patapsco River. The collapse occurred March 26 after the Maersk-chartered Dali container ship lost power and crashed into one of the bridge’s columns, taking most of the overpass down with it.
Shipments originally headed for the Port of Baltimore are mostly divided among major ports in the northeastern U.S., according to data from supply chain visibility platform Project44.
Most of the rerouted cargo (43 percent) is headed toward Norfolk at the Port of Virginia, while New York is getting 26 percent of the shipments. Most of the remaining containers are going to the Port of Wilmington in North Carolina (13 percent) and Newark-Elizabeth in New Jersey (10 percent), while 8 percent are expected to travel to other ports.
Various ports along the northeast have pledged to take on the additional cargo, causing concerns about potential congestion. According to the Project44 data released Tuesday, there is currently no impact on import dwell rates at these alternate ports.
On the other hand, recent Drewry data indicates that congestion could still increase due to an expected jump in utilization rates at the northeastern ports. In 2023, total terminal utilization across the Baltimore, N.Y.-N.J., Philadelphia and Virginia hubs was estimated to have been 60 percent.
But when accounting for a 10.6 percent expected improvement in port throughput across North American ports in 2024, the removal of Baltimore from the equation could push the utilization rates in the region as high as 79 percent.
“Terminals operating at this level for a sustained period are likely to experience congestion, even more so if the increase in utilization occurs over a short time period,” said Eirik Hooper, senior analyst, ports and terminals, Drewry.
The shutdown of the Port of Baltimore also impacts those working at the gateway who are temporarily out of a paycheck.
On March 27, Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson announced his office would draft emergency legislation for an income replacement program for impacted workers and businesses.
Called the PORT Act, which stands for Protecting Opportunities and Regional Trade, Ferguson said that the money would come from Maryland’s roughly $2 billion rainy day fund. The bill would establish temporary relief programs for the thousands of port workers and businesses impacted by the collapse.
A hearing on the bill was held 1 p.m. on Tuesday, with lawmakers hoping to pass the bill by the end of the week. The state has set up a dedicated unemployment line for all workers affected by the port closure.
Of the 15,000 employees estimated to be employed at the Port of Baltimore, roughly 2,400 are union dockworkers represented by the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA). On Monday, union leadership held a members-only emergency meeting to update the workers on recent restoration efforts and implications on workers’ benefits and wages.
But ILA Local 333 president Scott Cowan told Baltimore TV news affiliate WMAR that there has been no timetable for a return.
“We are not getting any kind of ballpark yet,” said Cowan. “That channel needs to be opened within the maximum of four weeks to get these ships back in here and get the men and women of the ILA back to work, get the economy for the state rolling.”
Sourcing Journal reached out to the ILA.
In the fallout of the accident, the Dali’s operator Synergy Marine Group and Grace Ocean Private Ltd. filed a court petition Monday seeking to limit their legal liability, a routine procedure for cases litigated under U.S. maritime law. With the case, a federal court in Maryland will ultimately decide who is responsible and how much is owed.
The filing seeks to cap the companies’ liability at roughly $43.7 million, which would be light compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars in damage claims Grace Ocean could face, according to legal experts interviewed by Bloomberg.
In the position, the parties estimate that the Dali vessel itself is valued at up to $90 million and was carrying freight worth over $1.1 million in income for the companies. The estimate also deducts two major expenses: at least $28 million in repairs and at least $19.5 million in salvage.
