China upgrades container ships on Yangtze River

WUHAN -- China has put a new container ship with a capacity of 1,140 standard containers into service on the country's longest river, the Yangtze, as part of an upgrade of vessels on the waterway.

The ship was commissioned to go on route between the port of Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei Province, to the Yangshan Deep Water Port in Shanghai on the river's estuary, on Friday. The route is about 1,000 km long.

The Yangtze is the world's busiest waterway. More than 2.3 billion tonnes of cargo are transported through ports on the main stream of the river every year, both imports and exports.

The new ship is 130 meters long, nearly 24 meters wide and has a maximum load of 13,600 tonnes.

Feng Boming, general manager of the Strategy and Corporate Management of China COSCO Shipping Co. Ltd., said that compared with existing ships, the new vessel doubled the shipment capacity and used 20 percent less daily fuel.

It is the first of the six container ships built by COSCO for the Wuhan New Port Administration Committee. The other five will be put into service in 2019.