Cover Story
on more than 2,300 vessels. They also have memorized every buoy, shoreline, water depth and obstruction along the waterways leading to Virginia’s marine terminals to pass Virginia’s rigid exams. And they have attended training pro- grams around the world. The OOCL Malaysia — the
vessel Collins is about to board — is part of a class of container ships that first began visiting the East Coast in May. These massive vessels bring goods from Asia through the newly widened Panama Canal. The OOCL Malaysia has a cargo capacity of 13,208 TEUs or 20-foot-equivalent units. Before May, the largest ship the port had handled was around 11,500 TEUs. The port now handles ships of
13,000 to 14,000 TEUs on a weekly basis — and likely will see them more often. The arrival of these ships high-
lights the maritime community’s push to deepen and widen its channels. These ultra-large container vessels (ULCVs) require a section of the port’s busy channels to be restricted to one-
way navigation as they enter or leave Hampton Roads, which can back up traffic in the port. “[The widening and dredging project] is by far Hampton Roads’ number one priority,” says Art Moye, executive vice president of the Virginia Maritime Association. “If we’re to have a future, and we’re to take full advantage of what’s happening as far as the global shipping world is con- cerned, deepening and widening our channels is of the utmost importance.”
Bringing the ships in The average size of container ships
has grown rapidly since Collins joined the pilots’ program in 2006. “Some- times I don’t have an appreciation for how big they are until I’m standing right next to them,” she says. Now it’s time for a close-up. As
the pilot boat approaches the OOCL Malaysia, Collins snaps on her sun- glasses, throws on a collared life vest and picks up a backpack carrying a high-tech navigation system. The water is calm this morning, and Collins climbs up the side of the big ship with ease.
The huge ships require pilots to
make many adjustments as they guide the vessels into port. They carry so many cargo containers that the bridge, where the navigation system is housed, is now in the front of the ship. That means that about 800 feet of the ship is behind Collins as she navigates the channel. From the time Collins climbs
aboard, the 28-mile journey to a berth at the Port of Virginia’s Norfolk Inter- national Terminals on the Elizabeth River takes four hours. These ships are so big, in fact, a tug boat is attached to the back of the massive vessel on the final few miles to slow it down. (A docking master is charged with parking the ships at terminals’ berths.) The largest impact of these giant
ships, though, is currently not at the terminals but along a 12-mile stretch of waterway known as Thimble Shoal channel. Extending east and west of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, the channel is too narrow to allow another ship traveling in the opposite direction to pass. “These ships are displacing
The new class of ships visiting the East Coast are longer than three football fi elds.
28 SEPTEMBER 2017
Photos by Mark Rhodes
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