During the Golden Week period, which is a seven-day or eight-day Chinese national holiday that occurs at the beginning of October, it is common for shipping lines to increase blank sailings to match the supply with the lowest demand. One of the key reasons is that the holiday causes the closure of factories and a drop in container volumes sent to and from Asia.

The two largest container lines, MSC and Maersk, announced last week the cancellation of more than 15 services. New information from data provider Sea Intelligence shows that an additional 29 sailings were blanked prior to the Chinese holidays. Sea Intelligence said that carriers were now on track to blank capacity at similar levels to pre-pandemic averages.

“For Asia – North Europe, capacity reductions now exceed previous years. The percentage of the blanked capacity on Asia-North Europe, across the four-week period, is now at 19.9%, which is higher than the 2017-2019 period,” said Alan Murphy, CEO of Sea Intelligence.

Maersk and MSC blank multiple Transpacific sailings

Several customer advisories were published since the beginning of September to announce that some sailings will be adjusted “in view of the demands drop during the October golden week holiday.”

Maersk said all cargoes of the TP11 service, which connects North America, the Indian Subcontinent and Asia, will be will be accepted on extra loader. In addition, changes will affect the TP 10, 16 and 17 services, as cargoes will be transferred or connected at Busan to TP12.

Similarly, MSC announced that "due to the anticipated slowdown in demand during and after the Golden Week holiday," it is planning an additional adjustment to capacity on its Asia to USA and Canada trade. According to the carrier, several services will be adjusted, including the Lion and Empire services, which will be blanked in weeks 38 and 39, respectively.