May 9, 2025. A large Crowley cargo ship named ‘Copán’ is sailing on a calm body of water under a partly cloudy sky. The ship has a black hull with a red bottom and is loaded with numerous blue and white shipping containers stacked neatly on its deck. The shoreline with green trees is visible in the background.
Copán, the second vessel in Crowley’s Avance Class fleet of LNG-powered containerships, has begun its inaugural commercial operations from the Port of Jacksonville, Florida (JAXPORT), further expanding the company’s capacity and enhancing speed of ocean shipping for the Caribbean Basin.
Named for one of the most important archaeological sites of the Mayan civilization in Honduras, Copán was specifically designed to quickly and frequently deliver cargo while using lower emission liquefied natural gas (LNG) for fuel.
These capabilities make the Avance Class vessels — pronounced in Spanish “ah-bahn-seh” with the English meaning of advance — uniquely suited to quickly transport perishable goods like food and pharmaceuticals, as well as retail products, apparel, breakbulk cargo between the U.S., Central America and the Dominican Republic. The 1,400-TEU (20-foot equivalent units) ships can serve diverse container sizes for dry cargo and feature capacity for 300 refrigerated containers in their weekly port calls.
“Copán and its sister ships continue our investments to innovate our frequent and fast ocean carrier capabilities to meeting the critical needs of customer in the U.S., Central America and the Dominican Republic,” said Brett Bennett, senior vice president and general manager, Crowley Logistics. “These vessels build on Crowley’s decades-long commitment for diverse and robust supply chain solutions in the Caribbean Basin while advancing LNG as a solution in the maritime industry’s ongoing energy transition.”