Post Date: 13/11/2020 Courtesy: Seatrade Maritime News
Lars Ostergaard Nielsen, Head of Americas Liner Operations Cluster, Maersk, explained to the audience how transhipment hubs had provided a platform for the shipping line combine arrangements for crew change across vessels in a single location.
“Transhipment hubs have actually been an opportunity. It’s been a fact that having many vessels coming into one location has actually meant we have had the opportunity to make certain arrangements around transhipment hubs to facilitate crew changes.
“I don’t think we factored that into our planning before, but it’s certainly shown itself as something of value as we have had the ability to make arrangements with authorities, with hotels. with airlines for charter flights. And it’s easier of course if you have to manage a lot of people bringing them to one location versus a distributed global crew change policy,” he explained.
In terms of the situation for a crew change at present for Maersk Nielsen commented: “From a company like Maersk it’s been very painful that we’ve had our seafarers at sea for a way too long, and while it’s getting better it’s certainly still a challenge.”
