Fidelio makes waves on maiden voyage

The vessel which, like its sister ship the CMA CGM Medea has an overall length of 349 m and a GRT of 109,000 tonnes, was greeted at KCT by tugs spraying fountains of water through their firefighting equipment. Work began immediately on the 7,800-plus container exchange, discharging and loading cargo for the UAE, the Upper Gulf and Indian Ocean ports.

“We were delighted to see this impressive vehicle alongside our new berth,” said Peter Richards, general manager of Gulftainer, which manages the terminal. “We are one of the very few ports in the region that can handle this size of vessel and, I might add, the next generation of very large container ships as well.”

A few weeks earlier, the CMA CGM Fidelio left Le Havre on its maiden voyage, a 56-day trip that involved calls at the ports of Rotterdam, Hamburg, Zeebrugge, Southampton, Malta, Khorfakkan, Ningbo, Yantian, Hong Kong, Port Klang and Malta. It is currently deployed on the FAL 1 (French Asia Line 1) service, but this will eventually be integrated into FAL 2, the new Far East liner service with China Shipping.