Seatrain Lines

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SeaTrain Lines was a shipping company most responsible for the introduction of the standard international shipping container, most commonly 8 foot high by 8 foot wide by 40 foot long. This ignited an explosion in world trade, though the ups and downs in that trade made it very difficult for companies to ride the business.

[edit] History

Seatrain Lines began by hauling rail cars from the port of New York to Havana, Cuba. In 1953, operations to Cuba ended and Seatrain became a coastal carrier. In 1956, The first container ship, a converted T-2 tanker named "Ideal-X", departed from Newark, New Jersey to Houston, Texas with 58 containers. In 1967, they stopped hauling rail cars and converted to only containers. The company also engaged in ship building, at the old Brooklyn Navy Yard, but was not successful in that endeavor. Seatrain Lines filed for bankruptcy under chapter 11 in 1981.

[edit] Containerization

The key to the revolution was standardized containers, which initially could be stacked five high onboard ships. Containerization allowed tremendous cost saving versus so called "break-bulk" where each piece of cargo had to be loaded and unloaded individually. Malcom McLean conceived the concept of containerization while sitting in his truck at the port waiting for a ship to be unloaded. Simply put, his idea was to separate the truck's "box" from its chassis and wheels.

The containers were relatively large since costs tend to be per container and not per tonne, and the dimensions were initially chosen to suit highway limits and rail bridges and tunnels; container sizes have since grown taller which has created problems with some smaller tunnels.

Today the international standard (ISO) allows 20', 40' and 45' length containers, all 8' wide, while individual countries have their own domestic standards. Standard height containers have a maximum height of 8'6" while high-cube containers are 9'6" tall. Modern container ships hold up to almost 15,000 TEU's.

Containers are a key component of intermodal transportation. This concept moves he container box from road chassis to train to ship and back again. Intermodal trains carry containers doubled-stacked (2 high) and are over a mile long.