Recliner wrote:

It will still be far cheaper to send it by sea, even if the containers
have to be trans-shipped. The huge container vessels unload (very
efficiently) at a large port, then the containers continue by smaller
ship/barge, train or truck.

Air freight is generally only used for items with a short shelf-life
or needed quickly. For example, Scotch whisky by sea, Scottish salmon
by air. Cars by sea, urgently needed car spares by air.

And on one occasion a GM locomotive to Irish Rail but that was more to
meet a crew training schedule
rather than the loco perishing on a sea voyage.

PS: A lot of container ships are not currently being loaded in China,
so there's now a shortage of containers! And in a couple of months,
there will be gaps on our shelves.


At least one of the large container shipping companies that was already
heavily in debt is attracting concern as to how it may ride a period of
downturn.

https://gcaptain.com/cma-cgms-debt-p...d-virus-fears/

The knock on effects of reduced trade will be felt here by others as well,
not many days pass without a CMA vessel calling in to Southampton. There
is some relevance to UK Railway ,many of the containers they carry are
moved to and from the Port by train. We could see trains of container
flats progressing with lots of gaps in a few weeks time.

If things get too bad then companies may reassess their dependence on
somewhere like China for production behind the brandnames and no longer put
all their eggs in one basket , we may even see some manufacturing return.
One thing we may have give up is buying some cheap electrical components
sourced from China that cost little more than the postage. I reckon ebay
will soon have a lot less items available for immediate delivery before
too long has passed.

GH