The largest ship to ever visit the U.S. east coast arrived at the port of Savannah on Thursday after traveling through the expanded Panama Canal from Asia.
The COSCO Development entered the mouth of the Savannah River at about 7 a.m. Thursday morning, drawing large crowds of spectators as it made its way past Savannah’s downtown River Street and under the Talmadge Memorial Bridge before docking at the Garden City Terminal at around 11 a.m.
With 13,092 TEU capacity and measuring 366 meters long by 48.2 meters in beam, COSCO Development is the largest ship to ever visit the east coast of the United States. Earlier this month it also became the largest ship to transit the Panama Canal Expansion.
The COSCO Development is deployed on the new OCEAN Alliance’s weekly South Atlantic Express (SAX) service, connecting Asia-US East Coast ports via the Panama Canal. The SAX service has a total of 11 vessels ranging in size from 11,000 to 13,000 TEUs. The OCEAN Alliance includes China COSCO Shiping, Orient Overseas Container Lines (OOCL), CMA CGM Group and Evergreen.
Following Savannah, COSCO Development will call at the port of Charleston.
Editor’s note: COSCO Development actually made it first east coast port visit on May 8 when it arrived at the Virginia International Gateway at the port of Virginia.
Ports along the U.S. east coast have had record container volumes since the opening of the Panama Canal Expansion in June 2016 thanks in part to the investments made to accommodate the larger ships coming through the Panama Canal.
