The unusual sight of vessels incapable of the berth is due in part because of a massive backlog that has been created by a sudden surge in American buying before the holiday season.
The number of ships that are now anchored outside the major ports, which moves 40 percent of containers in the United States, has tripled over the course of the past two months to 62. Lines are now at their longest since the beginning of the pandemic.
The backup at the nation's busiest port complex has been brought on by a pandemic-induced buying boom, joined with a labor shortage that has overwhelmed the port workforce, according to port officials.
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The shipping traffic jams come as the U.S. and some other economies are starting to head towards normalcy and reveals how messy the reopening of business is proving to be over 18 months since the pandemic’s onset. It further reveals just how fragile supply chains remain.
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The 62 container ships waiting to dock include 42 container ships physically at anchor and 20 in drift areas, according to the Marine Exchange of Southern California, which tracks ship traffic in the region.
The West Coast ports have faced traffic since August, when a then record-breaking 44 container ships were stuck off the coast due to similar disruptions.
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The traffic-jam at the ports, which works as the central entry point for goods coming from China, has even directly affected the prices for artificial Christmas trees.
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The port of Long Beach is now testing out a 24/7 pilot program that would increase the hours for cargo pickup to a time when there is less traffic in the region, allowing for faster deliveries.
'We are in the midst of an historic surge in cargo, and our terminal operators and other supply chain partners are giving their all to keep it all moving,' Port of Long Beach Executive Director Mario Cordero announced in a statement. 'We welcome this pilot project by TTI as a first step toward extending gates to 24/7 operations, and we encourage our cargo owners and trucking partners to give this innovative program a try.'
Shipping company FedEx is rerouting over 600,000 packages a day as it scrambles to handle the labor shortage plaguing businesses throughout the US.
Raj Subramaniam, chief operating officer at FedEx, announced this week that understaffing problems have caused 'widespread inefficiencies' at the shipping company.
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Subramaniam explained that big shipping hubs, like the one in Portland, Oregon, are running on '65 percent of the staffing had to handle its normal volume.'
As a consequence, the hubs are diverting about 25 percent of the packages that normally come through, Fox Business News reports.
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