Freight News, Sea

Hull-Sweden shipping link axed

[ February 27, 2014   //   Chris ]

UK/Scandinavia shipping line TransPal Line has been closed down, say owners TransAtlantic. The Swedish operator blamed weak market conditions facing its Industrial Shipping division.

TransPal ran regular container services from Hull – which had lately taken over from Goole as the UK call – to Hamburg, Szczecin (Poland), Ahus and Norrkoping in Southern Sweden.

In a press statement, TransAtlantic said: “As a part of the efforts to improve the profitability within Industrial Shipping it has been decided to immediately close down the unprofitable container service TransPal Line involving closure of offices and terminal in Hull (United Kingdom) and Szczecin (Poland). The decision affects 70 employees, mainly in the UK, Poland and headquarters in Gothenburg.”

Details of the TransPal schedule have been removed from the company’s website, although services between the Continent and Scandinavia and intra-Scandinavian services remained.

In its year-end results for 2013, Transatlantic – which makes much of its money from offshore work- added that an agreement was signed in December to divest the two small container vessels TransOdin and TransFrej used on the TransPal Line. The transaction was concluded in January.