Hapag-Lloyd and ONE Warn Most Cargo on Espirito Santo Express Lost

Most of the cargo aboard the fire-damaged containership Espirito Santo Express is likely severely damaged or a total loss, according to customer advisories issued by Hapag-Lloyd and Ocean Network Express (ONE), more than two weeks after fire broke out on the vessel in the South Atlantic.

Both carriers said they had received information from the ship's owner, Seaspan, indicating that the vast majority of the cargo may be beyond recovery. "Based on the latest information received via the vessel owner Seaspan we expect the vast majority of the cargo to be either severely damaged by the fire or a total loss," Hapag-Lloyd said in its latest update.

ONE confirmed the assessment in its own advisory. The vessel was operating on ONE's East Coast South America Express 1 (SX1) service at the time of the incident.

What happened to the vessel?

The 11,800-TEU Espirito Santo Express caught fire on October 15 while sailing from Singapore to Santos, Brazil. The Singapore-flagged ship was built in 2018 and chartered by Hapag-Lloyd from Seaspan. An October 22 statement from Seaspan said smoke and then flames were observed coming from cargo in a bay forward of the vessel's accommodation block.

All 28 crew members abandoned ship and were rescued by the Portuguese-flagged bulk carrier Aeolian Arrow. The rescue, however, ended in tragedy. The bulk carrier's chief officer fell overboard while its rescue boat was being recovered, disappearing beneath the water. Portuguese maritime accident investigators said he could not be recovered.

What does this mean for shippers?

The fire is now under control, but the vessel has yet to reach a port of refuge, where the full extent of the damage can be assessed. Hapag-Lloyd warned that getting the ship to safety and inspecting the cargo will take considerable time. The condition of individual containers remains unknown.

For customers with cargo aboard, the outlook is grim. Hapag-Lloyd said it will contact customers whose shipments may be salvageable to arrange cargo surveys once the vessel reaches port and an initial damage assessment is completed. Neither carrier has provided a timeline for when the vessel might reach port.

Firefighting and salvage operations continued in the days after the blaze. As recently as October 22, Hapag-Lloyd said the extent of the damage remained unknown and it could not determine the condition of individual shipments.

The latest warnings from the two carriers provide the clearest indication yet of the scale of the losses. A full assessment will still have to wait until the ship reaches a port of refuge.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation. Neither carrier has offered a timeline for the vessel's arrival at a safe port, leaving shippers on the Asia–East Coast South America trade facing weeks of uncertainty before cargo claims can even begin to be quantified.