ETOUSA managed to unload 115 ships in November. The port commanders managed to improve the discharge rate from per ship per day to through offering incentives such as extra leave to their best performing hatch crews. The opening of the port of Antwerp on 28 November promised to solve the port capacity problem, but the German Ardennes Offensive caused a halt to the movement of supplies to the threatened depots around Liege, and they piled up at the ports. Unloading had to be curtailed, and on 23 December ETOUSA requested that 24 ships be cut from the next convoys. Only 130 ships were unloaded in December, and based on Franklin's sanguine assessment of capacity, the War Department cut the number of sailings to 175 in January and February. By the end of January, 116 vessels lay idle awaiting discharge, and on 3 February, ETOUSA recommended that March sailings be cut from 233 to 203. The War Department went even further and reduced it to 172. However, February saw a steady increase in the discharge rate, which rose to over per day, an increase of per day over what had been achieved in December and January, and the shipping crisis finally appeared to be resolved.