Port of Los Angeles: Handled more than 1 million TEUs in May, the 10th consecutive month of year-over-year growth and up 74% year-over-year. It was the busiest month in the port's 114-year history and the first time a western Hemisphere port has handled more than 1 million teUs in a month.
Port of Oakland: The port handled 1.08 million containers from January to May, a record high.
Port of New York-New Jersey: Cargo volume continued to grow by double digits. Cargo handled at the Port of New York and New Jersey increased 23.8% to 7,966,93TEU in May 2021. This is the 10th consecutive month that throughput at the port has increased.
Port Jacksonville, Florida: Container throughput hit a new monthly record in May, reaching 128,900TEU, up 37% from a year earlier and surpassing the port's previous monthly container throughput record of 123,700TEU set in October 2019.
The numbers underscore the strains on U.S. ports, where volumes are rising and container imports remain high.
According to the American Retail Association, imports of containers at U.S. ports will remain above 2 million TEU in each month from May to September, up from previous forecasts. This is mainly due to a gradual recovery in economic activity, but inventories at U.S. retailers remain near 30-year lows and strong restocking will further boost cargo demand.
Congestion has eased and ship turnaround times have improved at major west Coast ports in the past few months, but importers and logistics companies face more trouble in the months ahead.Congestion stretches inland from the ports
Seko Logistics executives say the surge is putting new pressure on rail and trucking networks at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and elsewhere.
Craig Grossgart, Seko's senior vice president for global shipping, expects a flood of goods to hit the West Coast in the coming months. He noted that because of last year's lockdown, there will be strong demand for all sorts of things as children and teenagers return to school and adults return to work, which will lead to further congestion.The current congestion comes from the strain on the entire landside transport network, stretching inland.In Chicago, the number of stranded containers has been growing. Customers are unable to carry their containers, he notes, but still have to pay storage fees. Carriers, in turn, suffer from storage charges, as landside rail traffic is disrupted along with the suspension of container traffic at the terminals.Maersk: The delay will result in a loss of up to 33 per cent of transatlantic capacityUs ports are clogged, dozens of Asian ships are waiting to unload, and The US is still buying up foreign goods. According to the latest data released by the United States, the country imported 232.4 billion dollars (about 1.5 trillion yuan) of goods in May, near a record high.
The problem of cargo ships queuing to unload has lasted for half a year。
In April, there were media reports that Asian ships carrying as many as 14,000 containers had run aground on the West Coast of the United States, with some remaining for more than a week and sometimes as many as 40 vessels waiting to be unloaded.
Maersk, the world's largest container ship operator, says it has lost 20 per cent of its west Coast capacity to and from Asia this year; A further 13 per cent of capacity is expected to be lost from June to the end of August; The impact is already worse than the Suez Canal accident in March.