Not only are ships not allowed to unload, containers waiting to be picked up are a being held back by the ports collateral And even the ports did alow them in. Hanjing would probably not as the vessels could expect to be immediately repossessed by the firm's Beyond the ships and containers, there is of course the cargo within those containers in many cases part of a tight chain of supply and delivery. September, the global shipping industry is already into what is its busiest time of the year ahead of the Christmas season Just imagine, there are some 540,000 containers with cargo caught up at sea,' explains Lars Jensen, chief executive of Sea Intelligence Consulting in Copenhagen That means that a lot of the goods en route to the US are geared at the busy year-end holidays and any distuption will be a major headache for the companies that have entrusted their products into the hauls of the Hanjin freighters