Evergreen Marine Corporation

Evergreen Marine Corporation is a container shipping company with divisions based in Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Hong Kong. Shipping containers worldwide is dangerous; Evergreen’s hundreds of ships have seen more than a few accidents. Injured workers and their families have rights under maritime law to fight the maritime company and seek compensation.

About Evergreen

Evergreen Marine Corporation, often referred to as just Evergreen, is a large container shipping company headquartered in Taiwan.

Evergreen is the fourth-largest container shipping company in the world, with a combined container capacity approaching one million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs). The main routes it uses to ship goods are between:

• Europe and North America
• East Asia and Europe
• East Asia and Australia
• East Asia and North and Central America.

History of Evergreen Marine Corporation

Among worldwide shipping companies, Evergreen is relatively young. Many other maritime companies date back to the 1800s, but Evergreen was founded in 1968 by Dr. Yung-Fa Chang.

The company began with only one second-hand general cargo ship. Its full container shipping service started in 1975 and primarily included shipping between East Asia and the U.S.

In 1984, Evergreen introduced two-day, round-the-world shipping, an innovative move that temporarily made Evergreen the largest shipping company in the world.

Evergreen Operations and Fleet

Evergreen is primarily a shipping company with a fleet of ships large enough to carry nearly one million TEUs of containers. The ships can carry a variety of cargo, including reefer or refrigerated cargo.

The company’s containers are characteristically green with a white Evergreen logo, but the reefer containers are white with a green logo. Evergreen operates in more than 80 countries and services hundreds of ports worldwide.

The Evergreen fleet of over 100 container ships includes those that can carry as much as 8,500 TEU and nearly 100,000 tonnage in gross weight. All ships can carry refrigerated containers.

Evergreen moves cargo worldwide, with its busiest routes going from East Asia to North and Central America and back again. The most active route in this region is between China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and the west coast of the U.S.

Evergreen and Safety

Evergreen launched the Evergreen Seafarer Training Center in 1999 to help prevent accidents, injuries, deaths, and environmental spills. The training facility is one of the most sophisticated of its kind and, in 2001, was given an ISO-9001 in recognition of quality management.

Since then, the company has received numerous other awards and recognitions for its commitment to training workers in safety and prevention.

Regardless of extensive training and numerous awards, Evergreen is not immune to accidents that cause damage and worker injuries. Container shipping is dangerous work; even good training can end in tragedies. Workers may be hurt because of:

• Ship collisions
• Ships running aground
• Falls overboard
• Moving cargo, cranes, and containers
• Trips and falls
• Miscommunications or misunderstood directions
• Training or operational procedure errors

Evergreen Maritime Accidents

Maritime companies are responsible for providing environments and training that make doing the job as safe as possible. Even so, accidents happen, sometimes due to negligence on the part of the employer and sometimes simply by accident.

Evergreen may have committed to training workers, but that doesn’t mean they have never been injured.

Ship Collision

Collisions are always newsworthy accidents, even when workers are fortunate enough to be spared injury. Such was the case in 2015 when one of Evergreen’s ships, the Ever Smart, collided with the tanker Alexandra I.

The collision occurred in the waters off of the United Arab Emirates and was blamed on poor judgment. A pilot was found to have left the Ever Smart too early, and workers on that ship were not looking out well enough or monitoring the movement of the tanker with which they collided.

No one was hurt, and no environmentally damaging leaks occurred. Both ships suffered significant damage. 

Crane Collision

Another incident that cost Evergreen money in damage to equipment occurred in 1987 in Baltimore. The Ever Living ship was in the process of docking in the port in Baltimore. It was docking during a snowstorm, possibly contributing to the accident.

Part of the large ship hit the leg of a $1.3 million container crane. The crane fell and landed on a service building, but fortunately, no one was hurt in the incident, and the ship was not significantly damaged.

Longshoreman Injury

Not all incidents ended without harm to maritime workers. In 2012, a longshoreman in the Port of Elizabeth was injured in an accident and successfully sued Evergreen.

He was on the Ever Decent when part of the deck gave way and sank six inches. He fell and hit his back, suffering extensive back injuries.

Evergreen eventually settled with the longshoreman, who argued that the ship had not been adequately maintained, leading to his accident and injuries.

Suez Canal Incident

In 2021, an Evergreen container ship, the Ever Given, got stuck in the Suez Canal. For about a week, it blocked this crucial part of a major world shipping route.

Evergreen said the incident occurred when strong wind gusts altered the ship’s course. Although no one was hurt in the incident, it held up billions of dollars of freight each day it was stuck in the channel.

The incident raised questions about the practicality of operating such large ships in a canal that is only 300 meters wide. The Ever Given is 400 meters long.

Maritime Workers’ Rights

The injured worker who won a settlement took advantage of his rights as a maritime worker. If you work in this industry, a set of maritime laws protects you and provides a way to get compensation in the event of an injury.

The laws also offer an avenue for getting monetary damages for your loved ones if you are killed on the job. The laws vary in which kind of workers they apply to and the requirements for proving negligence.

If you are injured on the job, whether you are a seaman, a longshoreman, or an offshore oil and gas worker, one or more of these laws apply to you.

Before you accept any agreements from your employer, contact a professional and experienced maritime lawyer to guide you in your next steps. A maritime company may try to give you less than you are owed, so rely on this professional to ensure you get what you need.