Photo: Courtesy of OOCL

A 24,188 twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU) ultra-large container ship named "OOCL Felixstowe" was delivered to Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL) at the Dalian COSCO KHI Ship Engineering Co (DACKS) shipyard in Northeast China's Liaoning Province on Tuesday, OOCL said in a statement on its website.

Yang Zhijian, chief executive officer of OOCL, said at the delivery ceremony, "We ordered this series of ultra large container vessels not only to provide better services to our customers, but also to enhance our cost competitiveness and to seize the initiative for future development."

With a total length of 400 meters, a width of 61.3 meters, a height of 75 meters, and a design draft of 14.5 meters, the new vessel possesses the capacity to accommodate 24,188 standard containers. It is designed with greatly improved operation efficiency and caters to the green, low-carbon and intelligent development trend in the shipping industry, domestic media outlet The Paper reported.

The ship's maximum load capacity of 228,000 tons also makes it one of the world's largest container ships, according to its manufacturer, Dalian COSCO KHI Ship Engineering Co.

OOCL Felixstowe is the fourth eco-friendly 24,188 TEU vessel received by OOCL in a series of 12, and will be serving the Asia-Europe LL3 service with her sister vessels.

Ultra-large container ships have become signature vessels for leading Chinese shipbuilders.

In April, CSSC, the world's largest shipbuilder, signed an agreement to build 16 super-sized container vessels for French shipping group CMA CGM - the largest single order by value received by a Chinese shipbuilder.

Global Times