AAL to take delivery of two heavy lift vessels

AAL SHIPPING is expanding its core fleet to 720,200 total deadweight with the delivery of the Pacific Action and AAL Gladstone.

Both vessels have served in the AAL fleet in the past and have a maximum lift capacity of 240 tonnes, four cargo holds and three tweendecks.

AAL’s fleet already includes two sister vessels: AAL Genoa and Pacific Alert (which will be named AAL Galveston).

AAL managing director Kyriacos Panayides said large heavy lift multipurpose ships of this calibre and lifting capability represent a small fraction of the global MPP fleet.

“AAL is uniquely well experienced in optimising their operations and harnessing their strengths in order to generate value for our customers’ global trading demands. They will add much needed capacity to a portfolio of multipurpose shipping services that have grown exponentially over the past 12 months,” Mr Panayides said.

“Since February 2020, we have built a scheduled monthly liner service between Europe, Middle East and Asia, a regular monthly tramp service between Asia and the Americas and frequent sailings from Asia to Europe – all this in addition to our Asia-Australia Liner Services and global Tramp Chartering operations. It has been an extremely busy and sustained period of growth for AAL and these new ladies will help to drive that momentum forward.”

Marc Willim, the general manager of AAL’s chartering team, said the G-Class are large 25,800 DWT MPVs.

“Global trading is only now emerging from the negative impact of COVID and also important multipurpose cargo sectors like oil and gas are still pressured. However, there is growing optimism and the recent surges in the container and commodity markets have demonstrated the importance of being flexible and ready to serve cargo demand and from wherever it may come,” Mr Willim said.

“We are seeing market economies begin to strengthen and rebuild in confidence across Europe, Middle East, Asia and the Americas and trade war machinations of 2020 resolve. Energy, steel, infrastructure, bulk and general cargoes are all trading worldwide. Carriers like AAL, that have the expertise, trade route infrastructure and fleet capability to parcel these big and small cargoes on the same sailings and deliver worldwide will be in a position to offer shippers timely solutions and highly competitive economies of scale.”