by Tim Rasmussen After the container was loaded in Spokane on September 12, 2023, and began to move toward Guatemala, there were several documents involved. These documents contained information about the contents of the container, the ship it would be on, and the likely dates the ship would leave Seattle and arrive in Guatemala. The main documents are the Bill of Lading, which references another sheet containing a description of the items loaded including the weight of each item, and the Booking Confirmation showing the arrangements our shipping agent, Independent Ocean Services, made for the movement of the container. It is the ship name, voyage number, and reference numbers. These documents are generated by the shipping agent in New York City and transmitted to the various entities who will have dealings with the container as it makes its way to where it is going. They add information to the documents along the way, then keep a copy. Water for Life added the seal number, list of items, and weight; the trucking company added the container number and truck number; and the port will add certain information as they “gate” the container in, then put it on the ship. The container will be placed on the vessel Sofia Paz operated by the Mediterranean Shipping Company. The ship was constructed in 2014 and is registered in Liberia. The ship is 980 feet long and carries 9000 twenty-foot containers if they are all 20-footers. Ours is a 40-foot container with extra capacity, called a high-cube. The ship was supposed to leave the Port of Seattle on September 21 and arrive in Puerto Barrios on October 26. All these dates can slip if there are delays. At this stage, they are just guesses, I guess. I can track the progress of the ship by looking it up on a website called Ship Tracker. It gives the position of the ship, the speed of the ship, the course and heading of the ship, its current draught, its destination, and expected arrival date. The container also has a device that communicates with a satellite, and you can track the container the whole way as well, whether it is in a port or on a ship. Pretty amazing. The cost of shipping a 40-foot high-cube container from Spokane to Puerto Barrios, Guatemala, is about $6000. There are other fees and costs that will be added, I am sure. Any delay in the leaving port or in the arriving port is charged to the shipper, even though the shipper has nothing to do with creating any delay. Everyone gets a piece of the pie. So now you know. If you want to ship a container over the ocean, please contact us through this publication. We can get you started on how to do it. If you would like to help Water for Life, contact Gary Bartholomew at 509-939-1941 Tim Tim Rasmussen may be contacted via e-mail to michele@ worldwidedrillingresource.com WTR 34 JANUARY 2024 WorldWide Drilling Resource®
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