The Port of Tacoma’s container shipment volume was up for the second month in a row in April, new statistics from the port show.
The port’s terminals handled a total of 117,793 20-foot-equivalent containers last month, compared with 112,908 for the same month a year ago. That’s a 4.3 percent improvement.
That higher volume, however, was not quite enough to wipe out the year-to-date deficiency through the end of last month. Thanks to a nearly 12 percent decline in container business in February, the port’s four-month totals are down 0.4 percent from 2011.
Other port cargoes through April were a mixed story of increases and decreases. Breakbulk cargo, goods too big or awkward to be shipped in containers such as large machinery, construction equipment and the like, is up 79.3 percent for the year.
Logs, last year’s big success story, are down in volume this year by 48.4 percent. The port, a longtime log exporter, got out of the log business early in the last decade. It returned to the business in 2010 when container traffic fell.
Auto imports were up for the year. by 14 percent. And gypsum for wallboard was up 435 percent. Grain shipments fell slightly by 0.6 percent.
john.gillie@thenewstribune.com 253.597-8663