Westport ushered in K-Line’s Roro (Roll on – Roll off) car carrier ‘Malacca Highway’ on her maiden voyage plying the South East Asian trade route. The 1800 car-capacity vessel left dry dock on 25 March 2001 and began her maiden voyage from Higashi Harima.

An exchange of memento ceremony was held on board the vessel between Capt Alex G Pacio, Master of the ship and Mr Mark Wong, Westport’s General Manager of Marketing. Also present to witness the ceremony were Mr Eiichi Murakami, General Manager – Trade Management Division of K Line (Singapore) and Mr Robert Lim, Managing Director of K Line (Malaysia).

Before arriving at Westport, the vessel had called Osaka, Nagoya, Yokohama, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Ho Chi Minh and Singapore. Her next port of call would be Colombo before returning to Osaka.

A total of 150 cars and 75 packages were discharged at the terminal. The car units consisted of both transshipment as well as local cargo of which the transshipment cargo was made up of forklifts, motor graders, tractor heads and used motor vehicles. Whereas the local cargo included light commercial vehicles, forklifts, wheel loaders excavators, prime movers and mixer trucks.

The 75 packages consisted of accessories and heavy machinery parts that is shipped in packages.

‘Malacca Highway’ has dimensions of 139 m length and 23.2 m breadth with DWT of 17,735 tonnes and requires an approximate 7 metre draft.

K-Line vessels call Westport regularly and to date a total 25 vessels have called Westport this year.