CK Line connects western Japan with China

CK Line, a carrier dedicated in Korea/Japan trades, is kicking off a direct service between Dalian, China and western Japan and Hokkaido beginning November 21.

CK Line is making the service available through a joint-service with the Korea Maritime Transportation Corporation (KMTC) in the trade from the end of October, 2001. This service was put together from two already existing services: one which connects Pusan with Dalian, Tianjin and Xingang from CK Line while the other is operated by the KMTC in western Japan.

This service connecting Dalian with western Japan and Hokkaido is a fixed day weekly service at Dalian (Mon) - Pusan (Wed) - Tomakimai (Sat) - Muroran (Sat) - Toyama (Mon) - Kanazawa (Tue) - Ulsan (Wed) - Pusan (Thu).

Also, the Xingang/western Japan service also calls at Xingang (Fri) - Pusan (Mon) - Sakai Minato (Tue) - Niigata (Wed) - Toyama (Thu) - Tsuruga (Fri) - Maizuru (Sat) - Ulsan (Sat) and Pusan (Tue).

"Though this service is just an amalgamation of existing services, it eliminates the necessity of transshipping for Pusan and China/Western Japan trades. For those cargoes, this combined service will offer shippers fantastic savings in terms of time and cost," said an executive director at CK Line.

CK Line and the KMTC are deploying one container vessel each, one 620 TEU vessel in the Dalian trade and one 340 TEU vessel in the Xingang trade.

CK Line is also now considering a pendulum service from Shanghai and Qingdao to western Japan.

The first joint-service agreement between CK Line and the KMTC was launched at first in October last year in the Pusan/Niigata service trade through a space chartering agreement.