What was the name of the first container ship to transit the expanded Panama Canal?

The first container ship to transit the expanded Panama Canal was COSCO Shipping Panama.

Its inaugural passage took place on June 26, 2016, during the opening of the Canal’s new Neopanamax locks. The ship was selected through a draw involving major canal customers and crossed the new Agua Clara and Cocolí lock system as part of the expansion’s inauguration.

The vessel had originally been named Andronikos before being renamed COSCO Shipping Panama. It was a large container ship for the period, measuring about 299.98 metres long and 48.25 metres wide, with capacity for roughly 9,400 TEUs. TEU means “twenty-foot equivalent unit,” the standard measure used for container capacity.

The ship’s transit is sometimes confused with the first commercial transit after the inauguration. Commercial operations began on June 27, 2016, when the LPG tanker Lycaste Peace became the first commercial vessel to use the expanded locks. Other milestones followed, including the first LNG carrier and the first cruise ship to pass through the new system.