Maersk route suspensions

Maersk said on April 23 that cargo tied to the Strait of Hormuz and Jebel Ali is facing delays, with some containers stuck in transshipment and others still waiting offshore. (maersk.com) The company said the affected loads include South Africa exports and imports moving through Jebel Ali, plus cargo aboard the CMA CGM Antonio, which Maersk said remains at anchor off Dubai. Maersk said three container ships were attacked by Iranian forces this week and that the strait “remain[s] firmly closed.” (maersk.com) On April 22, Maersk said it was still avoiding Strait of Hormuz transits after consulting security partners, even after a temporary United States-Iran ceasefire. The carrier also said it had suspended or limited bookings across parts of the Gulf network, including reefer cargo to several markets and many ocean bookings to the United Arab Emirates outside Khor Fakkan. (maersk.com) Maersk said overland alternatives through ports such as Salalah in Oman and Jeddah in Saudi Arabia exist, but long-haul capacity is limited and the cost is “prohibitively high,” making those workarounds hard to scale. The company has also rolled out emergency freight and bunker surcharges during the crisis, including a global fuel surcharge updated on March 31 and Gulf freight increases first announced on March 2. (maersk.com; maersk.com; maersk.com) The bottleneck matters because Jebel Ali is the region’s biggest trade hub. DP World said the port handled 15.5 million twenty-foot equivalent units in 2024, its highest annual container volume since 2015. (dpworld.com) When a hub that size slows, cargo does not simply stop at the dock; it backs up across feeder ships, transshipment schedules, truck moves, and cold-chain bookings. Maersk said cargo already in transit is being managed case by case, while fresh bookings in several corridors remain paused or restricted. (maersk.com; maersk.com) Maersk separately said on April 20 that it had temporarily suspended new bookings to and from Berbera in Somaliland because of schedule changes. It told customers that alternatives via Djibouti, Mogadishu, and Mombasa were still available. (maersk.com) The pressure is spilling into food logistics, where time matters as much as price. IntraFish reported on April 22 that Maersk warned seafood shippers about higher costs and longer transit times as fuel disruption and rerouting strain refrigerated capacity. (intrafish.com) That leaves importers and exporters with a narrower set of choices: pay more for scarce alternatives, wait for capacity to reopen, or reroute through ports farther from the Gulf chokepoint. For now, Maersk says safety conditions in and around the Strait of Hormuz still do not support a normal restart. (maersk.com; maersk.com)