Ocean Freight - How Long and $$$$

Ocean Freight – How Long and $$$$

This post has taken more time than I expected. It was easier in my Corporate Days to ask the Transportation Manager plus we had long term established rates. But a main purpose of this blog is to provide links to free information on line as it relates to Supply Chain.
1. Normal container sizes include a 20 ft, a 40 ft and a 40 ft high container. We don’t require any temperature control (Although I had a quality nightmare with melting wax on a yarn shipment.)
2. Check this site out for the dimensions and cube sizes of standard containers.
http://www.geocities.com/freighterman.geo/container.html
3. This site is loaded with information about all types of international shipping. I found the calculator to be too complex for my estimate purposes but it was a great refresher on shipping basics. http://www.shipping-worldwide.com/help.htm
4. It’s common in the Caribbean to use a Ro-Ro and not a container. That means the trailer is Rolled onto the Vessel and sails to the destination country where it is Rolled Off. Containers don’t have wheels. The containers are put on a chassis.
5. I registered with Maersk to gain access to their Rate Schedules and Routes. http://www.maerskline.com/appmanager/ They appear to screen potential users and issue a “Certificate” that must be downloaded before access is allowed on many parts of their site. Not sure if you need to be a potential customer or if they’ll allow the general public. Again, there’s a lot of information and I haven’t decoded all the references. I did stumble on the Schedule and corresponding days In-transit.
a. From Qingdao, China to LA, USA it’s only 14 days. Departs Qingdao on Saturday and arrives LA on Friday. (Qingdao the home of a great GREAT beer in China. http://www.tsingtaobeer.com/ )
b. From Chennai, India to Newark, NJ it takes 27 days. It shows the Vessel stopping in Oman, Jordan, Egypt and Spain before continuing it’s West Bound route to the east coast of the USA.

More later this week!

And this reminds me, it’s pretty cool to cross the international date line. I’ve actually gotten in discussions with folks that don’t believe it’s a 24 hour time different. Maybe they were consuming to much Tsingtao beer. Or maybe China’s famous Dynasty wine http://www.dynasty.com.cn/index.asp which we nick named Duh Nasty …it’s not really bad we’re just being immature Americans.
Gan BAY ( http://matadornights.com/how-to-say-%e2%80%9ccheers%e2%80%9d-in-50-languages/ )

Sincerely,
The Underwear Maven
http://www.keylargounderwear.com/servlet/StoreFront