Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd have brought an Asia-to-Mediterranean Sea shipping service back to the Red Sea effective immediately, with the vessel-sharing alliance calling the move a step toward a “gradual” return to the trans-Suez corridor even amid a regional security situation that remains tense.
The Majestic Maersk container ship will sail the Gemini Cooperation’s joint AE15/SE3 service via the trans-Suez Canal route, already having departed from Qingdao on June 8. According to MarineTraffic, the vessel left the Port of Salalah in Oman Monday morning.
Vessels on the route will stop at Chinese ports in Qingdao and Ningbo, South Korea’s Port of Gwangyang and Malaysia’s Port of Tanjung Pelepas, before sailing through the Indian Ocean and Red Sea. After passing through the Suez Canal, vessels will stop at Egypt’s Port Said and Damietta Port. From there, ships will make a return route where they will stop at Sri Lanka’s Port of Colombo and the Port of Singapore.
“Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd will continue to monitor the security situation in the Middle East region very closely, and any alteration to services within the Gemini Cooperation will remain dependent on the ongoing stability in the Red Sea area and the absence of any escalation in conflicts in the region,” said Maersk in a customer advisory.
The Danish shipping giant said contingency plans were in place in the event the security situation deteriorates. Alternative plans for the service include reverting individual sailings or bringing the whole service back to the Cape of Good Hope route.
In mid-February, the Gemini Cooperation initially resumed their joint ME11/IMX service, which connects India and the Middle East with the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal. But these transits were suspended shortly after the outbreak of the Iran war.
The companies sent out an advisory to customers Monday morning, a day after a cargo ship reportedly was attacked in the southern Red Sea.
According to a Sunday alert from the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center (UKMTO), the incident occurred 30 nautical miles (roughly 35 miles) southwest of Hodeida, Yemen, which is under control of the Iranian-backed Houthis.
The notice indicated that an unidentified cargo vessel triggered a distress alert stating that it was under attack by unknown armed assailants. Local authorities are investigating the incident.
It has not been confirmed who attacked the unidentified vessel, as no group has claimed responsibility for the attack.
According to a report from the Associated Press, a skiff approached the bulk carrier and opened fire, forcing the vessel’s security guards to return fire, before sailing back to a larger ship about two nautical miles (2.3 miles) away with its automatic identification system transponder switched off.
It is the first such known incident in the Red Sea in 2026.
The Houthis had backed off any attacks on shipping in the Red Sea since Israel and Hamas came to a ceasefire to end their two-year war last fall. The U.S.-designated terrorist organization had begun firing on commercial vessels traversing the waterway in late 2023 in solidary with Palestinians in Gaza, forcing major ocean carriers to divert vessels away from the pathway around southern Africa’s Cape of Good Hope.
After the U.S. and Israel began their military campaign in Iran, the militant group had again threatened to restrict passage through the waterway with a “complete and total ban” on Israeli and Israeli-affiliated ships. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) followed up with its own threat to extend its “resistance security belt” from the Strait of Hormuz to the Red Sea’s southern chokepoint, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. No attacks in the area have been tied to the IRGC.
Instead, there have been various maritime incidents in recent weeks in the neighboring Gulf of Aden, the UKMTO reports. Those have largely been conducted by pirate groups in Somalia.
After hostilities between the U.S. and Iran began to simmer, more carriers have been braving out the trek through the Suez Canal.
The number of container ships sailing via the Suez Canal rose to 35 in the week ended June 28, according to the Drewry Red Sea Diversion Tracker. This represented the highest weekly number since January as more carriers become more comfortable with making a Red Sea return
It’s mostly smaller ships that are passing through the region. That week, CMA CGM (six ships), Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) (one ship) and Maersk (two ships) were the only carriers to send ships of more than 8,000 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) through the Suez Canal.
Overall, 59 cargo vessels transited through Suez in the two-week period ahead of June 28, up 7 percent from the movement over the previous 14-day stretch.
Even if there are any new disruptions in the area, freight operations would not change much, according to Freightos head of research Judah Levine, who noted last month that “the vast majority of container traffic continues to divert away from the Red Sea.”
However, for Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, the AE15/SE3 service return could be a sign of the carriers being open to more services moving through the Egyptian channel.
“The move could trigger further Gemini re-routings to the Suez as the two carriers are falling further behind their rivals in the capacity rankings,” said container shipping consultancy Linerlytica in a weekly update Monday.
The update indicated that Maersk is set to fall behind CMA CGM for second-largest container shipping capacity worldwide by July 2027, while Hapag-Lloyd could be usurped by Ocean Network Express (ONE) in February 2028.
Hapag-Lloyd has sought to expand its fleet in planning to acquire fellow carrier ZIM, but that deal is in jeopardy as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz have spoken in opposition of the agreement.
ZIM said Monday morning it “continues to act in accordance with the agreement” and is working with relevant state authorities as part of the ongoing regulatory review process.
The update does not change the merger terms but reiterates that completion remains subject to conditions such as shareholder and regulatory approvals.
