Dutch project reports on box safety at sea

A three-year project to investigate the reasons containers are lost overboard has been completed by the Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands (Marin). The Lashing@Sea project included monitoring five ships in operation, testing secured cargo and an extensive survey of crews in the container, ro-ro and heavylift sectors.

The Dutch government, with the UK and Swedish maritime administrations, are now set to make several recommendations to the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) and the International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) in a bid to improve safety levels and operational efficiency. The project team is proposing a unified interpretation of standards for lashing in reduced sea conditions, and it has called on the IACS to develop it into a formal recommendation as a working document for the IMO. The group urged the industry to give further consideration to the working environment and so-called "out of design" conditions. It also recommended that current international standards be reviewed and updated to take the project findings into account. Marin is also recommending that the weight of containers should be properly recorded and, to prevent boxes shifting, the stack should not be over-weighted.