Busan port has become a launching pad for a vessel which aims to become the world’s first ship to navigate an Arctic sea route carrying containers. 

Venta Maersk, the ice-strengthened 36-hundred twenty-foot equivalent unit vessel, left the South Korean port city on Wednesday on route to the North Pole. 

With around a thousand containers on board, the ship owned by the world's largest container shipping company Maersk, will pass through the Arctic sea to the Bremerhaven port in Germany and then to Russia’s St. Petersburg port. 

The route is expected to cut the travel time from Asia to Europe by up to two weeks compared with the existing route using the Suez Canal. 

The voyage is being made amid growing expectations that Busan port will be the origin and the destination port for the Northern Sea Route.