Maersk Diverts All Vessels Away from Red Sea

Maersk plans to continue diverting vessels away from the Red Sea, until further notice, after temporarily halting transit operations in the waterway earlier this week to assess the situation.

This decision represents a slight but important modification from what the Danish company said it would do previously. This January, the shipping giant announced that it would avoid the region until further notice, after another of its tankers was attacked within a few weeks. The pause was then intended to have time to "better assess the  situation."

Maersk decided to divert all ships scheduled to cross the Red Sea via the Gulf of Aden to the south, to the Cape of Good Hope route. The company said in a statement Friday: “By suspending our ships through the Red Sea/Gulf of Aden, we hope to provide our customers with greater stability and predictability despite the delays associated with changing the route. All available intelligence confirms that security risks remain at a significantly high level.”

The company concluded in its statement: “We still hope to reach a sustainable solution in the near future, and we are doing everything we can to contribute to achieving it, but we nevertheless urge customers to prepare for continued complications in the region, with major disruption to the global shipping network.”

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