Makutu skips CT to avoid 300-hour delay

Whatever happened to
Safmarine Makutu? One
moment she was off Cape
Town, the next she had
disappeared from sight and
from updated container
terminal records – but all
finally became clear at
week’s end.
She bypassed Cape Town
rather than incur delays in
excess of 300 hours.
Terminal data for
February 24 confirmed
her arrival five days
previously and a plan to
berth her on March 3, by
which time her total delay
(including 38 hours of wind
stoppage) would have been
305.48 hours.
New container terminal
executive Moshe Motlohi
explained it was planned
to work the non-CTOC
vessel on a first come first
serve basis at Berth 603,
once preference had been
accorded CTOC vessels.
Provisional stack dates
were planned for February
17-19 but the ship’s
operators requested the
stack be firmed later and
stack dates provisionally
were scheduled according to
the 72-hour window period.
“Due to wind delays and
CTOC vessels arriving
within their slot times,
the stack was firmed for
between February 22-24
for her to begin working on
February 25 at 22h00, with
a total of 393 import and
381 export containers
to handle.”
On February 23, the
vessel’s operators informed
TPT’s national planning
and IT offices Safmarine
Makutu would bypass
Cape Town and her cargo
was rolled over to the
Maersk Dellys.
Latest information from
Cape Town Container
Terminal is that the
terminal was windbound
for 9 hours and ten minutes
between February 27/28,
holding up work on
Empress Haven (Berth 601)
and Willi Rickmers
(Quay 501).
MSC Carla was most
severely affected, 182 hours
in all, of which 49.6 hours
was weather-related.