Carriers cancel scheduled sailings (blank sailings) to prop up rates, and shippers have zero recourse when their booked cargo gets stranded

Ocean carriers routinely cancel scheduled voyages — called blank sailings — to reduce capacity and prevent freight rates from falling. In early 2026, deep-sea departure cancellation rates hit 9%. When a carrier blanks a sailing, the shipper's container that was already booked, packed, and trucked to the port simply does not leave. The cargo sits at the terminal accumulating storage charges until the carrier decides to load it on a later vessel — which might be a week or two later, or might also get blanked. This matters because the shipper has already committed to delivery dates with their buyer. A blanked sailing means a retailer's seasonal merchandise arrives after the selling window closes, or a manufacturer's production line sits idle waiting for components. Rolled cargo from blank sailings often incurs $500 to $1,200 in repack and storage costs per container. But the real damage is upstream: the shipper's customer loses trust, cancels future orders, or demands penalty discounts. For small and mid-size importers operating on thin margins, a single blank sailing can turn a profitable shipment into a loss. This problem persists because carrier alliances coordinate blank sailings across their members, effectively acting as a legal oligopoly. The top three alliances control roughly 80% of global container capacity. Shippers sign contracts that guarantee rates but not space — the contract says the carrier will charge you $2,000 per container, but it does not say the carrier will actually put your container on a ship. The Federal Maritime Commission has acknowledged this imbalance but has not required carriers to compensate shippers for blanked bookings. Until contracts guarantee both rate and space, carriers will keep using blank sailings as a one-sided price floor mechanism.