Felixstowe port has handled a European record cargo of 23,773 containers on a single ship.

The ship, which sailed from the Port of Felixstowe yesterday afternoon, was the 24,000 TEU MSC Diletta which was completing routine operations when it was thought to have broken the record.

Robert Ashton, operations director at the Port of Felixstowe, said: “The size of container ships has been increasing for many years and with growing demand for services into the Port of Felixstowe we are seeing ever greater container exchanges.

"We are also seeing a trend to consolidate cargo on fewer ultra-large ships.

"The MSC Diletta is operated on the 2M Alliance Griffin/AE55 Far East Asia to North Europe service.

“We are very pleased with the performance on this call and to have been able to work with the 2M partners to help achieve their objectives to supply the current high demand for far east imports to UK consumers.”

Work is currently underway to further increase the port’s ability to handle the world’s largest container ships.