r/business • u/Smooth_Navigator • 20d ago

Port Congestion in Long Beach, CA

166 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

9

u/cotz1995 20d ago

B/c Covid or what?

23

u/ubiquities 19d ago

This YouTube video By Wendover Productions is the most accurate depiction of what’s going on in the industry right now. I’ve been in international shipping for 20 years and never seen anything like this before. It’s a mess everywhere, but the biggest ports are getting it the worst.

9

u/PM_me_oak_trees 20d ago

Basically, yes. This article is from June, but what's happening now is pretty much a continuation of the same thing, as far as I am aware.

2

u/OrionBell 19d ago

In the Pacific Northwest, it's become such a clusterfest

Hehe the writer is funny. But I'm not really understanding the problem very well.

I live in the PNW near the Columbia river, and there are always ships tied to buoys parked in the river, sometimes for weeks at a time. Meanwhile, the store shelves are kind of bare. Fred Meyers for example, used to have crowed aisles you couldn't navigate your cart around because of all the extra displays. Now the shelves are not exactly empty but the some products are spread out at the front of the shelf with nothing behind them and some things are missing, like some kinds of paint.

I see ships traveling both directions on the river. I see enormous vehicle carriers going to Portland. I see ships getting loaded with raw logs in Longview. Obviously they are not the same ships. I'm not sure if they deliver the their load and go back empty.

Can you explain it some more please?

4

u/Altecobalt 19d ago

It's a combination of several things. Ports are congested because there is a significant demand in goods. These cargo containers need to be transported out of the port to a warehouse or store. However, there is a truck driver shortage which is hindering the movement of these containers in and out of the ports and to the stores. Because of this, these ships with thousands of containers have no where to offload and have to wait until there is available capacity.

So now we're in a situation where even though everyone is churning out everything to meet demand, they can't get it to where it needs to be causing delays and stock outs

1

u/raven00x 19d ago

are returning TEUs still in short supply or has that started to resolve itself?

1

u/Altecobalt 19d ago

There's still a container shortage and it'll get worse before it gets better as the holiday season comes around

1

u/raven00x 19d ago

That's what I thought. From what I heard containers were coming here, but not going back (because nothing to put in them to send back, maybe? not super clear on it) and that whole pileup was causing the container shortage.

1

u/PM_me_oak_trees 19d ago

I don't really know much beyond what is in the article, sorry. I suppose it's a pretty complicated situation.

1

u/Duches5 19d ago

Not enough rail allocation an or truckers to take cargo from us ports to their final destination. In addition the US is importing more and more. Source I work I'm ship planning.

4

u/thaughton02 19d ago

Thanks to scenes like this around the world, my shipping cost have more than quadrupled. This will cause a sever spike in consumer products prices.

2

u/wassupDFW 19d ago

I have seen similar if not bigger “congestion” near Hong Kong and Singapore ports. You will see miles upon miles of ships. Always felt like those ports were significantly more busy than the US ones. You will see true scale when you fly over them.

1

u/techmaniac 20d ago

That's insane.

1

u/neuromorph 19d ago

Was this because of the Eveegreen blockage or something else?

1

u/boner_jamz_69 19d ago

No that mostly effected east coast ports of the US. This is mostly from a previous covid outbreak at the port and supply chain issues throughout the world

1

u/caligaris_cabinet 19d ago

This is simply record demand on imports with low supply on vessels, trucks, and labor.

1

u/Justtooneupya 19d ago

I pull containers out of Long Beach for my job. It’s bad.