The 3,159 Chinese cars that sank off the coast of Alaska have come with a heavy price – $559M to be exact.
The Morning Midas was taking 3,159 vehicles from China to Mexico when it caught on fire.
Despite the best efforts of the US Coast Guard, the ship ended up sinking, taking all the cars onboard with it.
And this has racked up a hefty bill in the aftermath.
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The bill that came with the 3,159 Chinese cars that sank
The Morning Midas cargo vessel caught fire on June 3, just 340 miles south of Adak in Alaska.
When the crew couldn’t contain the flames, the ship was evacuated by all 22 crew members.
It later sank, with the ship’s management company, Zodiac Maritime, and the Alaska Coast Guard, both confirming they were monitoring the potential pollution after-effects.
A lot has been taken into account in the aftermath.
One particularly wince-inducing factor is the accumulated cost of all the cars onboard the Midas.
Analysts have tallied up the damage, and it’s looking like it’ll cost the car industry around $559 million.
Between 681 and 861 hybrids were onboard, alongside around 70 EVs from Chinese brands such as Great Wall Motor and Chery.
Anderson Economic Group estimated the value of the destroyed cargo at around $120 million, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Cleanup efforts, environmental damage, and the loss of earnings also have to be taken into account.
It’s a massive amount of money to lose.
A lot of money is lost when these ships go down
We’ve seen cargo ships go down before, and it’s never a good thing, particularly for the companies involved.
When the Felicity Ace and Fremantle Highway sank, the cargo losses were estimated to be $334.5 million and $302.6 million, respectively.
In the case of the former ship, it caught fire in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean in 2022.
At the time, a ton of Porsches and Volkswagens were on board.
And much like the Morning Midas, the ship’s crew evacuated.
There’s a lot of money at stake when cars are being transported across waters – precious cargo doesn’t even come close to describing it.
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