At 6 am on a dark October morning, Edith Maersk sailed up the Thames bound for London Gateway, and into the record books. At 397 metres long she is the largest container ship ever to berth on the river. She sailed some 15 hours later for Singapore, after containers were loaded up to nine high on her deck by the largest container cranes in the UK.

The vessel was guided into and out of port by PLA pilots, with the vessel movement coordinated by the PLA

Vessel Traffic Services team in Port Control, with the Duty Port Controller planning and overseeing both inward and outward passages, keeping a close eye on other traffic. Harbour masters supported and the harbour launch crew provided cover on the river, alerting a passing yacht to the early morning arrival.

A new London Gateway service that connects the UK with West Africa, started on 22 July. The service, operated by Hapag-Lloyd and MOL, supports the import of goods such as canned fish, timber, bananas, vegetables and other foodstuffs as

well as the export of chemicals, whitegoods, malt, fish and meat from the UK. Calls include Antwerp, Hamburg, DP World London Gateway, Algeciras, Dakar, Lagos / Apapa, Tema and Abidjan.

A ground breaking ceremony,
held in July at the London Gateway Logistics Park, officially kicked-off the construction of its 386,102
sq ft Common User Facility.
The multipurpose specialist
cargo-handling centre will enable occupiers to share warehousing and transportation, materials handling

equipment and labour. Designed to operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it will include cross-docking, storage, distribution and multi-user ‘pay-as-you-go’ value-added logistics services.