The Barents Sea, supports one of the world’s major fisheries, and is as such, already economically very important. Several major oil firms have expressed interest in exploring deep into Arctic territories, and governments of countries such as the United States, Russia, Canada and Norway have been preparing for this eventuality. RIGZONE published a very interesting article this week regarding Barents Sea exploitation.
US Navy minesweeper USS Guardian, which ran aground on Tubbataha Reef in the Sulu Sea the previous week, has turned 90 degrees due to strong currents. According reports the ship’s movement may have caused more damage to the reef’s fragile corals. The grounding occurred while the vessel was en route to Indonesia to participate in a training exercise. The vessel’s crew has been safely evacuated.
During a ballast operation at night, while at a shipyard in order to trim the vessel for drydocking, it was discovered that the engine room was flooded. Damage to submerged electrical equipment occurred Furthermore, the engine room had to be cleaned after the flooding. The ballasting could, however, have caused serious consequences for the safety of the vessel and sinking if not discovered in time.
Nowadays one cannot deny the widespread use of social media and the fact that they have find their way even in the Maritime Industry. Mark Clark, Director of Navigate Response wrote an interesting article regarding how social media can be used for the benefit of a shipping company. So you don’t work for a major shipping company, and you don’t have several thousand pounds to spend on large broadsheet adverts which showed your non existent links to the Olympic Games? Panic not, there is still hope to get the message out that you ship short sea aggregates from the UK to Europe, or run reefer ships to the West Coast of Africa, and are looking to build your customer base.
MAN Diesel & Turbo’s PrimeServ division in Frederikshavn has, in close cooperation with shipowner and constructional engineering company NCC, performed a propulsion equipment upgrade for the ‘MV Baltic’, a 900 m³ sand and gravel dredger. A 14 % improvement in fuel efficiency has been reported following an exchange and modernization of the vessel’s propeller blades and propeller nozzle.
During a normal daily inspection serious indents were found in a ship’s bow in way of the Bosun store at port side, affecting shell plating and 12 frames. The damage was assumed to have occurred during heavy weather conditions, which had caused bow impact pressure, which exceeded the capacity of the bow structure. This could either have happened because the sea state caused higher loads than accounted for in the class rules or the ship may have operated outside the range of “good marine practice”. Damage, has occurred quite frequently on container ships and also on other cargo ships, having comparable speed and high flare angle.
As time passes by and the enforcement date for the MLC 2006 is getting nearer a very interesting article written by Apostolos Belokas Managing Editor of SAFETY4SEA explains the best approach on implementing the new regulation. Shipping industry is facing a regulatory storm, including among other things the implementation of ILO MLC 2006 by August 20th of 2013 globally. There are many peculiarities related with ILO MLC, the most spicy one is with the deadline due. In case your flag state has ratified MLC by August 20th 2012 the deadline is by August the 20th 2013. In case your flag ratifies MLC after that date, say for example on 1st of February of 2013 then the deadline is by the 1st of February 2014, i.e. 12 months later. If your flag does NOT ratify the MLC you are not responsible for implementation. Is this correct ? Well, not exactly … Actually in line with the “NO more favorable treatment” principle of the MLC vessel will be subject to inspection by PSC worldwide and especially to countries that they have ratified MLC already (e.g. Netherlands, Australia etc.).
During late November 2012 the fourth engineer of a shipping company was convicted to life imprisonment on finding him guilty of killing the first engineer over previous enmity in the waters of Lagos, Nigeria, in 2005. The accused, was sentenced to life imprisonment along with an additional seven years of rigorous imprisonment for disposing of the body of the first engineer. Sessions Judge convicted the fourth engineer for murder and destruction of evidence.
The EU has been on record for several years that it would take regional action to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from ships, if no global agreement had been reached at the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) by the end of 2011. On 1 October 2012, European Commissioners Hedegaard and Kallas announced that the Commission would propose monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) of emissions as a starting point towards a more comprehensive system to reduce emissions. Although a significant number of ship-owners are already voluntarily monitoring the efficiency of their fleet, there is currently no legal requirement in Europe for ship-owners to keep track of their vessels’ direct fuel consumption and communicate this data to port state authorities. The precise requirements to be contained in the EU MRV scheme are not yet known. The legislative proposal is not expected before the first quarter of 2013. This paper by Transport & Environment NGO highlights some important aspects to be taken into account when developing a reliable emissions monitoring system and it investigates different options.
A 190-meter bulker suffered severe collision damage in Lagos, Nigeria. A large hole in the hull plating prevented the ship from sailing at full speed. The classification society also demanded that the vessel go to drydock immediately unless an on-site solution was found. Hydrex therefore sent a diver/technician team to the vessel’s location to carry out an emergency doubler plate repair at anchorage.
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Officer of the Watch 