Shopping on line can be easy, simple and save you lots of money. It can also take a lot of your time, frustrate you, and result in unwanted purchases. Now the same can be said for regular high street shopping, but with the vast opportunity presented by the Internet it will pay you to spend a few minutes reading this and understanding how to better optimize your Containers shopping experience:

1. Compare - without doubt the biggest advantage that the Containers offers shoppers today is the ability to compare thousands of Containers at a time. This is a great thing, but not necessarily all the time! Too much can be daunting at times so take advantage of the great comparison sites and where possible let them do the hard work for you.

2. Research - if it has been said it will be on the internet. Ignorance is no longer a justifiable reason for buying the wrong thing. Take the time to research in detail everything that you could possible want to know about

3. Testimonials - don't know anybody that has bought a Containers? Wrong! If the Containers is good the internet will let you know. Use the Internet as a friend and get testimonials before you buy.

4. Questions - Got a question about Containers then search the Forums, FAQ's, Blogs etc. Don't be afraid to ask .....

5. Reputation - Never heard of the company selling Containers? Don't worry, no reason why you should know every company in the world, but you know someone that does! Use the internet to find out what people are saying about Containers and build up a picture of their reputation for sales, returns, customer service, delivery etc.

6. Returns - still worried that even after all of the above your Containers wont be what you want? Check out the returns policy. There is so much competition now that someone, somewhere is bound to offer the terms that you are comfortable with.

7. Feedback - happy with your Containers then let people know, after all you are depending on others people input in your buying decision, so why not give a little back.

8. Security - check for the yellow padlock on the Containers site before you buy, and the s after http:/ /i.e. https:// = a secure site

9. Contact - got a question about Containers, or want to leave a comment then check out the sites contact page. Reputable companies have them and respond.

10. Payment - ready to pay for your Containers, then use your credit card or PayPal! Be aware of companies that don't accept them, there may be genuine reasons but given the huge amount of choice you have when buying online there is no reason at all not to buy via credit card or PayPal.

.Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport cargo transport using standard International Organization for Standardization containers (known as Shipping Containers or Isotainers) that can be loaded and sealed intact onto container ships, railroad cars, airplanes, and trucks.

Containerization is also the term given to the process of determining the best carton, box or pallet to be used to ship a single item or number of items.

ISO container dimensions and payloads There are five common wikt:standardization lengths, 20-Foot (unit of length) (6.1 metre), 40-ft (12.2 m), 45-ft (13.7 m), 48-ft (14.6 m), and 53-ft (16.2 m). United States domestic standard containers are generally 48-ft and 53-ft (rail and truck). Container capacity is measured in twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU, or sometimes teu). An equivalent unit is a measure of containerized cargo capacity equal to one standard 20 ft (length) × 8 ft (width) × 8' 6' ft (height)'container. In International System of Units this is 6.10 m (length) × 2.44 m (width) × 2.59 m (height), or approximately 38.5 m³. These sell at about US$2,500 in China, the biggest manufacturer.

Most containers today are of the 40-ft (12.2 m) variety and are known as 40-foot containers. This is equivalent to 2 TEU. 45-foot (13.7 m) containers are also designated 2 TEU. Two TEU are equivalent to one forty-foot equivalent unit (FEU). High cube containers have a height of 9 ft 6 in (2.9 m), while half-height containers, used for heavy loads, have a height of 4 ft 3 in (1.3 m). When converting containers to TEUs, the height of the containers typically is not considered.

The use of United States customary units (also still used in UK) to describe container size (TEU, FEU) despite the fact that much of the world uses the metric system reflects the fact that US shipping companies played a major part in the development of containers. The overwhelming need to have a standard size for containers, in order that they fit all ships, cranes, and trucks, and the length of time that the current container sizes have been in use, makes changing to an even metric size impractical.

The maximum gross mass for a 20-ft dry cargo container is 24,000 kg, and for a 40-ft (including the 2.87 m (9 ft 6 in) high cube container), it is 30,480 kg. Allowing for the tare weight of the container, the maximum payload mass is there reduced to approximately 21,800 kg for 20-ft, and 26,680 kg for 40-ft containers.

Standard containers The 20 foot container is the most common container worldwide, but the 40 foot container is increasingly replacing it, particularly since costs tend to be per container and not per foot. The longer container types are also becoming more common, and are especially common in North America. Shorter containers, e.g. 10 foot containers, also exist, but are rarely used.

The following table shows the weights and dimensions of the three most common types of containers worldwide. The weights and dimensions quoted below are averages. Different manufacture series of the same type of container may slightly vary in actual size and weight.

{| class="prettytable"|-bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|colspan = "2" rowspan = "2"|!colspan = "2"| 20′ container!colspan = "2"| 40′ container!colspan = "2"| 45′ high-cube container|-bgcolor="#dfdfdf"!imperial system!metric system!imperial!metric!imperial!metric|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf" rowspan = "3" |external
dimensions!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|length|align = "right"|19' 10½"|align = "right"|6.058 m|align = "right"|40′ 0″|align = "right"|12.192 m|align = "right"|45′ 0″|align = "right"|13.716 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|8′ 6″|align = "right"|2.591 m|align = "right"|8′ 6″|align = "right"|2.591 m|align = "right"|9′ 6″|align = "right"|2.896 m|-!rowspan = "3" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|interior
dimensions!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|length|align = "right"|18′ 10 ″|align = "right"|5.758 m|align = "right"|39′ 5 ″|align = "right"|12.032 m|align = "right"|44′ 4″|align = "right"|13.556 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|7′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.385 m|align = "right"|7′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.385 m|align = "right"|8′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.698 m|-!rowspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|door aperture!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|7′ 5 ¾″|align = "right"|2.280 m|align = "right"|7′ 5 ¾″|align = "right"|2.280 m|align = "right"|8′ 5 ″|align = "right"|2.585 m|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|volume|align = "right"|1,169 ft³|align = "right"|33.1 m³|align = "right"|2,385 ft³|align = "right"|67.5 m³|align = "right"|3,040 ft³|align = "right"|86.1 m³|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|maximum
gross mass|align = "right"|52,910 lb|align = "right"|24,000 kg|align = "right"|67,200 lb|align = "right"|30,480 kg|align = "right"|67,200 lb|align = "right"|30,480 kg|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|empty weight|align = "right"|4,850 lb|align = "right"|2,200 kg|align = "right"|8,380 lb|align = "right"|3,800 kg|align = "right"|10,580 lb|align = "right"|4,800 kg|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|net load|align = "right"|48,060 lb|align = "right"|21,800 kg|align = "right"|58,820 lb|align = "right"|26,680 kg|align = "right"|56,620 lb|align = "right"|25,680 kg|}

20′ heavy tested containers are available for heavy goods (e.g. heavy machinery). These allow a maximum weight of 67,200 lb (30,480 kg), an empty weight of 5,290 lb (2,400 kg) and a net load of 61,910 lb (28,080 kg).

Shipping container history being loaded by a portainer crane in Copenhagen Harbour.s designed to handle containers have similar devices..

The introduction of containers resulted in vast improvements in port handling efficiency, thus lowering costs and helping lower freight charges and, in turn, boosting trade flows. Almost every manufactured product humans consume spends some time in a container. Containerization was one of the important innovations in 20th century logistics.

By the 1920s, railroads on several continents were carrying containers that could be transferred to trucks or ships, but these containers were invariably small by today's standards. From 1926 to 1947, the Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railway carried motor carrier vehicles and shippers' vehicles loaded on flatcars between Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Chicago, Illinois. Beginning in 1929, Seatrain Lines carried railroad boxcars on its sea vessels to transport goods between New York and Cuba. In the mid-1930s, the Chicago Great Western Railway and then the New Haven Railroad began "piggy-back" service (transporting highway freight trailers on flatcars) limited to their own railroads. By 1953, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad and the Southern Pacific Railroad railroads had joined the innovation. Most cars were surplus flatcars equipped with new decks. By 1955, an additional 25 railroads had begun some form of piggy-back trailer service.

The first vessels purpose-built to carry containers began operation in Denmark in 1951. Ships began carrying containers between Seattle and Alaska in 1951. The world's first truly intermodal container system used the purpose-built container ship the Clifford J. Rodgers, built in Montreal in 1955 and owned by the White Pass and Yukon Route. Its first trip carried 600 containers between North Vancouver, British Columbia and Skagway, Alaska on November 26, 1955; in Skagway, the containers were unloaded to purpose-built railroad cars for transport north to the Yukon, in the first intermodal freight transport service using trucks, ships and railroad cars. Southbound containers were loaded by shippers in the Yukon, moved by rail, ship and truck, to their consignees, without opening. This first intermodal system operated from November 1955 for many years.

The U.S. container shipping industry dates to 1956, when trucking entrepreneur Malcom McLean put 58 containers aboard a refitted tanker ship, the "Ideal-X," and sailed them from Newark to Houston. What was new about McLean's innovation was the idea of using large containers that were never opened in transit between shipper and consignee and that were transferable on an intermodal basis, among trucks, ships and railroad cars. McLean had initially favored the construction of "trailerships" - taking trailers from large trucks and stowing them in a ship’s cargo hold. This method of stowage, referred to as roll-on/roll-off, was not adopted because of the large waste in potential cargo space onboard the vessel, known as broken stowage. Instead, he modified his original concept into loading just the containers, not the chassis, onto the ships, hence the designation container ship or "box" ship. See also pantechnicon van and trolley and lift van.

During the first twenty years of growth containerization meant using completely different, and incompatible, container sizes and corner fittings from one country to another. There were dozens of incompatible container systems in the U.S. alone. Among the biggest operators, the Matson Navigation Company had a fleet of 24-foot containers while Sea-Land Service, Inc used 35-foot containers. The standard sizes and fitting and reinforcement norms that exist now evolved out of a series of compromises among international shipping companies, European railroads, U.S. railroads, and U.S. trucking companies. The bulk of the discussions occurred in the late 1960s and the first draft of the resulting ISO standards was prepared for publication in 1970.

In the United States, at first, containerization grew despite the unfavourable regulatory structure of the 1960s. But the United States' present fully integrated systems became possible only after the Interstate Commerce Commission's regulatory oversight was cut back (and later abolished in 1995), trucking and rail were deregulated in the 1970s and maritime rates were deregulated in 1984. http://www.dynamist.com/weblog/archives/002097.html

Containerization has revolutionized cargo shipping. Today, approximately 90% of non-bulk cargo worldwide moves by containers stacked on transport ships; 26% of all containers originate from China. As of 2005, some 18 million total containers make over 200 million trips per year. There are ships that can carry over 14,500 TEU ("Emma Mærsk", 396 m long, launched August 2006). It has even been predicted that, at some point, container ships will be constrained in size only by the depth of the Straits of Malacca—one of the world's busiest shipping lanes—linking the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. This so-called Malaccamax size constrains a ship to dimensions of 470 m in length and 60 m wide (1542 foot (unit of length) * 197 foot (unit of length)).

However, few initially foresaw the extent of the influence containerization would bring to the shipping industry. In the 1950s, Harvard University economist Benjamin Chinitz predicted that containerization would benefit New York by allowing it to ship industrial goods produced there more cheaply to the Southern United States than other areas, but did not anticipate that containerization might make it cheaper to import such goods from abroad. Most economic studies of containerization merely assumed that shipping companies would begin to replace older forms of transportation with containerization, but did not predict that the process of containerization itself would have some influence on producers and the extent of trading.

.The widespread use of ISO standard containers has driven modifications in other freight-moving standards, gradually forcing removable truck bodies or swap body into the standard sizes and shapes (though without the strength needed to be stacked), and changing completely the worldwide use of freight pallets that fit into ISO containers or into commercial vehicles.

Improved cargo security is also an important benefit of containerization. The cargo is not visible to the casual viewer and thus is less likely to be stolen and the doors of the containers are generally sealed so that tampering is more evident. This has reduced the "falling off the truck" syndrome that long plagued the shipping industry.

Use of the same basic sizes of containers across the globe has lessened the problems caused by incompatible rail gauge sizes in different countries. The majority of the rail networks in the world operate on a gauge track known as standard gauge but many countries like Russia, Finland and Spain use broad gauge while other many countries in Africa and South America use narrow gauge on their networks. The use of container trains in all these countries makes trans-shipment between different gauge trains easier, with automatic or semi-automatic equipment.

Some of the largest global companies containerizing containers today are Patrick Global Shipping, Bowen Exports and Theiler & Sons Goods, LLC.

Loss at sea Containers occasionally fall from the ships that carry them, something that occurs an estimated 2,000 to 10,000 times each yearPodsada, Janice. (2001-06-19) 'Lost Sea Cargo: Beach Bounty or Junk?', National Geographic News. Retrieved 2007-04-17. For instance, on November 30, 2006, a container washed ashore on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, along with thousands of bags of its cargo of tortilla chips. Containers lost at sea do not necessarily sink, but seldom float very high out of the water, making them a shipping hazard that is difficult to detect. Freight from lost containers has provided oceanographers with unexpected opportunities to track global ocean currents, notably a cargo of Friendly Floatees.

Numbering Each container is allocated a reporting mark (ownership code) up to four characters long ending in the letter U, followed by a number up to 9 digits long.

Double-stack containerization double-stack container train loaded with 53 ft (16.2 m) containers.

Most flatcars cannot carry more than one standard 40 foot container, but if the rail line has been built with sufficient vertical clearance, a gondola (rail) can accept a container and still leave enough clearance for another container on top. This usually precludes operation of double-stacked wagons on lines with overhead electric wiring (exception: Betuweroute).

Double stacking has been used in North America since American President Lines introduced this "double stack" principle under the name of "Stacktrain" rail service in 1984. It saved shippers money and now accounts for almost 70 percent of intermodal freight transport shipments in the United States, in part due to the generous vertical clearances used by US railroads.

Double stacking is also used in Transport in Australia between Adelaide, Parkes, Perth, Western Australia and Darwin, Northern Territory.

ISO container types Various container types are available for different needs:

Biggest ISO container companies {| class="wikitable"|+ Top 10 container shipping companies in order of TEU capacity, first January 2006|-! Company !! TEU capacity !! Market Share !! Number of ships|-| A.P. Moller-Maersk Group ] || 865,890 || 8.6% || 299|-| CMA CGM ] || 477,911 || 5.2% || 153|-| Hapag-Lloyd ] || 346,493 || 3.8% || 111|-| American President Lines ] || 328,794 || 3.6% || 145|-| COSCO ] || 302,213 || 3.3% || 105|}

Other container systems

Determining the best carton, box or pallet While the creation of the best container for shipping of newly created product is called "Containerization", the term also applies to determining the right box and the best placement inside that box in order fulfillment. This may be planned by software modules in a warehouse management system. This Optimization (mathematics) software calculates the best spatial position of each item within such constraints as their ability to stack and crush resistance.

Loss of jobs due to containerization Although there can be no direct correlation made between the new technology and a loss of jobs, there are a number of texts that talk about the job loss associated in part with containerization. In his paper regarding the reaction to containerization, Andrew Herod offers some specific numbers on the employment impact. Herod says that during break bulk shipping days 11,000 tons of cargo could be moved by 126 longshoremen in 84 hours. He goes on to say that the same weight of cargo can be moved by 42 longshoremen in only 13 hours with the use of containers. The new system of shipping also allowed for freight consolidating jobs to move from the waterfront to far inland somewhere, which also decreased the number of waterfront jobs.

Hazards Because of the value of their cargos, they raise the risk of container ships being subjected to piracy. The containers themselves are often used to smuggle contraband. In addition, due to the large numbers of essentially identical items, the vast majority never subjected to scrutiny, there are worries they might be used to introduce terrorists or bombs (including nuclear weapons) into ports undetected.

Empty container issues A social cost arises as a result of the high cost of transporting the empty containers back to the original shipping point by agents. This cost is often greater than that of containers themselves and because it is not often done, it results in large areas in ports and warehouses being occupied by empty containers left abandoned at their destination. However, empty containers may also be recycled in the form of shipping container architecture.

International Before the International Standard Container appeared, various countries had their own containers. These containers were generally small, and not able to be stacked one upon another. Clearly the idea of containerisation is not new, though the implementation of the ISO container was much better done.

Australia

Germany

United Kingdom

See also {||-valign=top| | width=40 || |}

References -->}

Further reading Economy — How Container Ships Changed the World — Containerisation from the 1950s to the Present

Technique — types, inspection, climate, stowage, securing, capacity — a guidebook for first responders during the initial phase of a dangerous goods/hazardous materials incident

.Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport cargo transport using standard International Organization for Standardization containers (known as Shipping Containers or Isotainers) that can be loaded and sealed intact onto container ships, railroad cars, airplanes, and trucks.

Containerization is also the term given to the process of determining the best carton, box or pallet to be used to ship a single item or number of items.

ISO container dimensions and payloads There are five common wikt:standardization lengths, 20-Foot (unit of length) (6.1 metre), 40-ft (12.2 m), 45-ft (13.7 m), 48-ft (14.6 m), and 53-ft (16.2 m). United States domestic standard containers are generally 48-ft and 53-ft (rail and truck). Container capacity is measured in twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU, or sometimes teu). An equivalent unit is a measure of containerized cargo capacity equal to one standard 20 ft (length) × 8 ft (width) × 8' 6' ft (height)'container. In International System of Units this is 6.10 m (length) × 2.44 m (width) × 2.59 m (height), or approximately 38.5 m³. These sell at about US$2,500 in China, the biggest manufacturer.

Most containers today are of the 40-ft (12.2 m) variety and are known as 40-foot containers. This is equivalent to 2 TEU. 45-foot (13.7 m) containers are also designated 2 TEU. Two TEU are equivalent to one forty-foot equivalent unit (FEU). High cube containers have a height of 9 ft 6 in (2.9 m), while half-height containers, used for heavy loads, have a height of 4 ft 3 in (1.3 m). When converting containers to TEUs, the height of the containers typically is not considered.

The use of United States customary units (also still used in UK) to describe container size (TEU, FEU) despite the fact that much of the world uses the metric system reflects the fact that US shipping companies played a major part in the development of containers. The overwhelming need to have a standard size for containers, in order that they fit all ships, cranes, and trucks, and the length of time that the current container sizes have been in use, makes changing to an even metric size impractical.

The maximum gross mass for a 20-ft dry cargo container is 24,000 kg, and for a 40-ft (including the 2.87 m (9 ft 6 in) high cube container), it is 30,480 kg. Allowing for the tare weight of the container, the maximum payload mass is there reduced to approximately 21,800 kg for 20-ft, and 26,680 kg for 40-ft containers.

Standard containers The 20 foot container is the most common container worldwide, but the 40 foot container is increasingly replacing it, particularly since costs tend to be per container and not per foot. The longer container types are also becoming more common, and are especially common in North America. Shorter containers, e.g. 10 foot containers, also exist, but are rarely used.

The following table shows the weights and dimensions of the three most common types of containers worldwide. The weights and dimensions quoted below are averages. Different manufacture series of the same type of container may slightly vary in actual size and weight.

{| class="prettytable"|-bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|colspan = "2" rowspan = "2"|!colspan = "2"| 20′ container!colspan = "2"| 40′ container!colspan = "2"| 45′ high-cube container|-bgcolor="#dfdfdf"!imperial system!metric system!imperial!metric!imperial!metric|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf" rowspan = "3" |external
dimensions!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|length|align = "right"|19' 10½"|align = "right"|6.058 m|align = "right"|40′ 0″|align = "right"|12.192 m|align = "right"|45′ 0″|align = "right"|13.716 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|align = "right"|8′ 0″|align = "right"|2.438 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|8′ 6″|align = "right"|2.591 m|align = "right"|8′ 6″|align = "right"|2.591 m|align = "right"|9′ 6″|align = "right"|2.896 m|-!rowspan = "3" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|interior
dimensions!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|length|align = "right"|18′ 10 ″|align = "right"|5.758 m|align = "right"|39′ 5 ″|align = "right"|12.032 m|align = "right"|44′ 4″|align = "right"|13.556 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ″|align = "right"|2.352 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|7′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.385 m|align = "right"|7′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.385 m|align = "right"|8′ 9 ″|align = "right"|2.698 m|-!rowspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|door aperture!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|width|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|align = "right"|7′ 8 ⅛″|align = "right"|2.343 m|-!bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|height|align = "right"|7′ 5 ¾″|align = "right"|2.280 m|align = "right"|7′ 5 ¾″|align = "right"|2.280 m|align = "right"|8′ 5 ″|align = "right"|2.585 m|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|volume|align = "right"|1,169 ft³|align = "right"|33.1 m³|align = "right"|2,385 ft³|align = "right"|67.5 m³|align = "right"|3,040 ft³|align = "right"|86.1 m³|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|maximum
gross mass|align = "right"|52,910 lb|align = "right"|24,000 kg|align = "right"|67,200 lb|align = "right"|30,480 kg|align = "right"|67,200 lb|align = "right"|30,480 kg|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|empty weight|align = "right"|4,850 lb|align = "right"|2,200 kg|align = "right"|8,380 lb|align = "right"|3,800 kg|align = "right"|10,580 lb|align = "right"|4,800 kg|-!colspan = "2" bgcolor="#dfdfdf"|net load|align = "right"|48,060 lb|align = "right"|21,800 kg|align = "right"|58,820 lb|align = "right"|26,680 kg|align = "right"|56,620 lb|align = "right"|25,680 kg|}

20′ heavy tested containers are available for heavy goods (e.g. heavy machinery). These allow a maximum weight of 67,200 lb (30,480 kg), an empty weight of 5,290 lb (2,400 kg) and a net load of 61,910 lb (28,080 kg).

Shipping container history being loaded by a portainer crane in Copenhagen Harbour.s designed to handle containers have similar devices..

The introduction of containers resulted in vast improvements in port handling efficiency, thus lowering costs and helping lower freight charges and, in turn, boosting trade flows. Almost every manufactured product humans consume spends some time in a container. Containerization was one of the important innovations in 20th century logistics.

By the 1920s, railroads on several continents were carrying containers that could be transferred to trucks or ships, but these containers were invariably small by today's standards. From 1926 to 1947, the Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railway carried motor carrier vehicles and shippers' vehicles loaded on flatcars between Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Chicago, Illinois. Beginning in 1929, Seatrain Lines carried railroad boxcars on its sea vessels to transport goods between New York and Cuba. In the mid-1930s, the Chicago Great Western Railway and then the New Haven Railroad began "piggy-back" service (transporting highway freight trailers on flatcars) limited to their own railroads. By 1953, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad and the Southern Pacific Railroad railroads had joined the innovation. Most cars were surplus flatcars equipped with new decks. By 1955, an additional 25 railroads had begun some form of piggy-back trailer service.

The first vessels purpose-built to carry containers began operation in Denmark in 1951. Ships began carrying containers between Seattle and Alaska in 1951. The world's first truly intermodal container system used the purpose-built container ship the Clifford J. Rodgers, built in Montreal in 1955 and owned by the White Pass and Yukon Route. Its first trip carried 600 containers between North Vancouver, British Columbia and Skagway, Alaska on November 26, 1955; in Skagway, the containers were unloaded to purpose-built railroad cars for transport north to the Yukon, in the first intermodal freight transport service using trucks, ships and railroad cars. Southbound containers were loaded by shippers in the Yukon, moved by rail, ship and truck, to their consignees, without opening. This first intermodal system operated from November 1955 for many years.

The U.S. container shipping industry dates to 1956, when trucking entrepreneur Malcom McLean put 58 containers aboard a refitted tanker ship, the "Ideal-X," and sailed them from Newark to Houston. What was new about McLean's innovation was the idea of using large containers that were never opened in transit between shipper and consignee and that were transferable on an intermodal basis, among trucks, ships and railroad cars. McLean had initially favored the construction of "trailerships" - taking trailers from large trucks and stowing them in a ship’s cargo hold. This method of stowage, referred to as roll-on/roll-off, was not adopted because of the large waste in potential cargo space onboard the vessel, known as broken stowage. Instead, he modified his original concept into loading just the containers, not the chassis, onto the ships, hence the designation container ship or "box" ship. See also pantechnicon van and trolley and lift van.

During the first twenty years of growth containerization meant using completely different, and incompatible, container sizes and corner fittings from one country to another. There were dozens of incompatible container systems in the U.S. alone. Among the biggest operators, the Matson Navigation Company had a fleet of 24-foot containers while Sea-Land Service, Inc used 35-foot containers. The standard sizes and fitting and reinforcement norms that exist now evolved out of a series of compromises among international shipping companies, European railroads, U.S. railroads, and U.S. trucking companies. The bulk of the discussions occurred in the late 1960s and the first draft of the resulting ISO standards was prepared for publication in 1970.

In the United States, at first, containerization grew despite the unfavourable regulatory structure of the 1960s. But the United States' present fully integrated systems became possible only after the Interstate Commerce Commission's regulatory oversight was cut back (and later abolished in 1995), trucking and rail were deregulated in the 1970s and maritime rates were deregulated in 1984. http://www.dynamist.com/weblog/archives/002097.html

Containerization has revolutionized cargo shipping. Today, approximately 90% of non-bulk cargo worldwide moves by containers stacked on transport ships; 26% of all containers originate from China. As of 2005, some 18 million total containers make over 200 million trips per year. There are ships that can carry over 14,500 TEU ("Emma Mærsk", 396 m long, launched August 2006). It has even been predicted that, at some point, container ships will be constrained in size only by the depth of the Straits of Malacca—one of the world's busiest shipping lanes—linking the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. This so-called Malaccamax size constrains a ship to dimensions of 470 m in length and 60 m wide (1542 foot (unit of length) * 197 foot (unit of length)).

However, few initially foresaw the extent of the influence containerization would bring to the shipping industry. In the 1950s, Harvard University economist Benjamin Chinitz predicted that containerization would benefit New York by allowing it to ship industrial goods produced there more cheaply to the Southern United States than other areas, but did not anticipate that containerization might make it cheaper to import such goods from abroad. Most economic studies of containerization merely assumed that shipping companies would begin to replace older forms of transportation with containerization, but did not predict that the process of containerization itself would have some influence on producers and the extent of trading.

.The widespread use of ISO standard containers has driven modifications in other freight-moving standards, gradually forcing removable truck bodies or swap body into the standard sizes and shapes (though without the strength needed to be stacked), and changing completely the worldwide use of freight pallets that fit into ISO containers or into commercial vehicles.

Improved cargo security is also an important benefit of containerization. The cargo is not visible to the casual viewer and thus is less likely to be stolen and the doors of the containers are generally sealed so that tampering is more evident. This has reduced the "falling off the truck" syndrome that long plagued the shipping industry.

Use of the same basic sizes of containers across the globe has lessened the problems caused by incompatible rail gauge sizes in different countries. The majority of the rail networks in the world operate on a gauge track known as standard gauge but many countries like Russia, Finland and Spain use broad gauge while other many countries in Africa and South America use narrow gauge on their networks. The use of container trains in all these countries makes trans-shipment between different gauge trains easier, with automatic or semi-automatic equipment.

Some of the largest global companies containerizing containers today are Patrick Global Shipping, Bowen Exports and Theiler & Sons Goods, LLC.

Loss at sea Containers occasionally fall from the ships that carry them, something that occurs an estimated 2,000 to 10,000 times each yearPodsada, Janice. (2001-06-19) 'Lost Sea Cargo: Beach Bounty or Junk?', National Geographic News. Retrieved 2007-04-17. For instance, on November 30, 2006, a container washed ashore on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, along with thousands of bags of its cargo of tortilla chips. Containers lost at sea do not necessarily sink, but seldom float very high out of the water, making them a shipping hazard that is difficult to detect. Freight from lost containers has provided oceanographers with unexpected opportunities to track global ocean currents, notably a cargo of Friendly Floatees.

Numbering Each container is allocated a reporting mark (ownership code) up to four characters long ending in the letter U, followed by a number up to 9 digits long.

Double-stack containerization double-stack container train loaded with 53 ft (16.2 m) containers.

Most flatcars cannot carry more than one standard 40 foot container, but if the rail line has been built with sufficient vertical clearance, a gondola (rail) can accept a container and still leave enough clearance for another container on top. This usually precludes operation of double-stacked wagons on lines with overhead electric wiring (exception: Betuweroute).

Double stacking has been used in North America since American President Lines introduced this "double stack" principle under the name of "Stacktrain" rail service in 1984. It saved shippers money and now accounts for almost 70 percent of intermodal freight transport shipments in the United States, in part due to the generous vertical clearances used by US railroads.

Double stacking is also used in Transport in Australia between Adelaide, Parkes, Perth, Western Australia and Darwin, Northern Territory.

ISO container types Various container types are available for different needs:

Biggest ISO container companies {| class="wikitable"|+ Top 10 container shipping companies in order of TEU capacity, first January 2006|-! Company !! TEU capacity !! Market Share !! Number of ships|-| A.P. Moller-Maersk Group ] || 865,890 || 8.6% || 299|-| CMA CGM ] || 477,911 || 5.2% || 153|-| Hapag-Lloyd ] || 346,493 || 3.8% || 111|-| American President Lines ] || 328,794 || 3.6% || 145|-| COSCO ] || 302,213 || 3.3% || 105|}

Other container systems

Determining the best carton, box or pallet While the creation of the best container for shipping of newly created product is called "Containerization", the term also applies to determining the right box and the best placement inside that box in order fulfillment. This may be planned by software modules in a warehouse management system. This Optimization (mathematics) software calculates the best spatial position of each item within such constraints as their ability to stack and crush resistance.

Loss of jobs due to containerization Although there can be no direct correlation made between the new technology and a loss of jobs, there are a number of texts that talk about the job loss associated in part with containerization. In his paper regarding the reaction to containerization, Andrew Herod offers some specific numbers on the employment impact. Herod says that during break bulk shipping days 11,000 tons of cargo could be moved by 126 longshoremen in 84 hours. He goes on to say that the same weight of cargo can be moved by 42 longshoremen in only 13 hours with the use of containers. The new system of shipping also allowed for freight consolidating jobs to move from the waterfront to far inland somewhere, which also decreased the number of waterfront jobs.

Hazards Because of the value of their cargos, they raise the risk of container ships being subjected to piracy. The containers themselves are often used to smuggle contraband. In addition, due to the large numbers of essentially identical items, the vast majority never subjected to scrutiny, there are worries they might be used to introduce terrorists or bombs (including nuclear weapons) into ports undetected.

Empty container issues A social cost arises as a result of the high cost of transporting the empty containers back to the original shipping point by agents. This cost is often greater than that of containers themselves and because it is not often done, it results in large areas in ports and warehouses being occupied by empty containers left abandoned at their destination. However, empty containers may also be recycled in the form of shipping container architecture.

International Before the International Standard Container appeared, various countries had their own containers. These containers were generally small, and not able to be stacked one upon another. Clearly the idea of containerisation is not new, though the implementation of the ISO container was much better done.

Australia

Germany

United Kingdom

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References -->}

Further reading Economy — How Container Ships Changed the World — Containerisation from the 1950s to the Present

Technique — types, inspection, climate, stowage, securing, capacity — a guidebook for first responders during the initial phase of a dangerous goods/hazardous materials incident



 

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