Red Sea security fears cut container shipments through Suez Canal

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The number of container ships at the mouth of the Red Sea on their way to or from the Suez Canal was 90 per cent down in the first week of January compared with the start of 2023, according to research showing the disruption to world trade by attacks on ships by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

The research, by the London-based shipping services company Clarksons, also showed that the number of container ships diverting from the Red Sea to travel round the Cape of Good Hope on January 9 was more than double the total as recently as December 21.

On the evening of Tuesday, the day the figures were compiled, Houthi rebels launched one of their biggest combined attacks on shipping so far. US Central Command said, with US and UK warships and aircraft shooting down 18 drones, two anti-ship cruise missiles and one ballistic missile.

No injuries or damage were reported in what the US said was the 26th attack on commercial shipping in the Red Sea since November 19.

Meanwhile, Germany’s Hapag-Lloyd, the world’s fifth-largest container line by capacity, indicated that it intended to continue diverting its ships away from the Red Sea towards the Cape.

Diversions via the southern tip of Africa add between 10 days and two weeks to each voyage between Asia and northern Europe. Shipping lines are also diverting some services between Asia and the US east coast that previously went via the Red Sea and the Suez Canal.

Container ships are the main means of transporting manufactured and semi-finished goods across the world.

Stephen Gordon, head of research for Clarksons, said container ship arrivals in the Gulf of Aden, at the entrance to the Red Sea, had been at “very low levels” since mid to late December.

“Container transits [of the Red Sea] are remaining at low levels and transits round the Cape building,” Gordon said.

Hapag-Lloyd said it still deemed the…