Hapag-Lloyd Diverts Vessel to Mexico After COVID Outbreak

Container line Hapag-Lloyd said Monday that one of its vessels diverted to Ensenada, Mexico, to evacuate three crew members with COVID-19 to a hospital.

The German carrier said the MV Rome Express, a container ship with the capacity to carry 12,552 twenty-foot equivalent units that operate on its Transpacific East Coast loop, made an unexpected port call in Ensenada after five crew members contracted the virus.

The remaining two crew members are in quarantine on the ship, Hapag-Lloyd said. 

Hapag-Lloyd notified customers that their cargo could be delayed. It said the vessel would remain at port until the alternate crew were tested and cleared to board. 

The MV Rome was en route to Busan, South Korea, via the Panama Canal after departing Cartagena, Colombia, when the decision was made to make an emergency stop in Mexico. The weekly westbound service calls at the ports of New York-New Jersey; Norfolk, Virginia; Wilmington, North Carolina; Charleston, South Carolina; and Savannah, Georgia, before heading to Cartagena. 

The MV Rome is now underway again in the Pacific Ocean, according to location tracking service Marine Traffic.

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

The preceding post was written and/or published as a collaboration between Benzinga’s in-house sponsored content team and a financial partner of Benzinga. Although the piece is not and should not be construed as editorial content, the sponsored content team works to ensure that any and all information contained within is true and accurate to the best of their knowledge and research. The content was purely for informational purposes only and not intended to be investing advice.

Image Sourced from Pixabay