By: OrePulse

Taiwanese container carriers Evergreen Marine Corporation and Yang Ming Marine Transport Corporation are resuming transits through the Red Sea toward the Suez Canal, joining a broader return of shipping lines to the route after nearly three years of diversions around the Cape of Good Hope, according to shipping consultancy Linerlytica.

Evergreen, described by Linerlytica as the last member of the Ocean Alliance group of carriers still avoiding the Red Sea, is scheduled to send its first vessels through the Suez Canal this week. Linerlytica said Evergreen will deploy the 16,556-TEU vessels Ever Eon and Ever Edit on November 7 and November 11, respectively, on the Ocean Alliance's NEU7/CES service. A third vessel, the 20,124-TEU Ever Gifted, is scheduled to join the Mediterranean-bound MD2 service on November 16.

Within the Ocean Alliance grouping, carriers CMA CGM, Cosco and OOCL had already resumed Suez transits before Evergreen's return.

The Premier Alliance, whose members include Ocean Network Express, HMM and Yang Ming, is preparing to restore additional Mediterranean services through the canal.

Separately, Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd said their Gemini alliance's ME1 service, which runs between India and Europe, will stop using the Cape of Good Hope route, with its first westbound departure under the new routing sailing from Salalah, Oman.

Linerlytica said Zim remains the main carrier still avoiding the Red Sea route, citing the continued risk that Houthi forces could target vessels associated with Israel.

Close to 3.4 million TEU of containership capacity transited the Suez Canal in the four weeks to late October. Maritime analytics firm Xeneta had previously estimated that a full industry-wide return to the Suez route could free up 6% to 8% of global containership capacity as new vessels enter service.