Transportation of Food: Ships: Specialized Ships

Specialized refrigerated ships (called reefers) have been constructed for particular transportation needs. For instance, the Tropicana Company, which made orange juice in Florida, began shipping orange juice by ship in 1957. The SS Tropicana, a tanker ship, carried an 8,000-ton cargo of orange juice (1.5 million gallons) from Florida to New York. Although the ship operated only until 1961 it set the stage for future shipping, which began in the 1970s. At that time tanker-like ships transported orange juice and orange concentrate from Brazil to the United States and Europe. The Premium do Brasil and its sister ship, the Carlos Fischer, were specifically designed for shipping aseptically processed orange juice and orange concentrate. Completed in 2004 the ships are operated by Citrosuco, a Brazilian company. These ships are 672 feet long, and each can hold 7.6 million gallons of juice, orange juice concentrate, or frozen juice. These vessels carry orange juice and orange concentrate to the United States, where it is packaged without identification of the country of origin.