Hapag-Lloyd and OOCL to cooperate with MSC on North Atlantic service

SLCS (St. Lawrence Co-ordinated Services) members, OOCL and Hapag-Lloyd, announced they have rationalized their jointly-operated SLCS1 North Atlantic service/ GEX1 with the Canadian Gateway service of Mediterranean Shipping Co. (MSC), known as the Montreal Express 1.

The first sailing of the new service, which has the objective of providing better overall port coverage, was the OOCL Belgium ETD Antwerp on July 30, 2009.

The partners deployed 4 vessels, the OOCL Belgium (2,808 TEU), Hapag-Lloyd Mississauga Express (2,808 TEU), the MSC Suez and the MSC Jordan (both 3,007 TEU).

Port rotation is Montreal, Liverpool, Antwerp, Bremerhaven, Le Havre, Liverpool and Montreal.
The other SLCS weekly service, SLCS2/GEX2, covering Montreal, Hamburg and Antwerp, is not part of this rationalization and remains unchanged.