Seacurus Daily: Top Ten Maritime News Stories 06/11/2017
1. Regressive Port State Decision
Warwick Norman, the CEO at third party ship vetting organisation RightShip, has blasted the decision by Paris MoU member states to stop providing data at source to industry and publish only via parismou.org and equasis.org as âregressiveâ. The decision is likely to come into effect at the end of March next year. The step back in transparency and the recent high profile InfluenceMap âIMO corporate captureâ report, suggests the shipping industry lobbyists are driving decisions – and this seems to be another of those.
Warwick Norman, the CEO at third party ship vetting organisation RightShip, has blasted the decision by Paris MoU member states to stop providing data at source to industry and publish only via parismou.org and equasis.org as âregressiveâ. The decision is likely to come into effect at the end of March next year. The step back in transparency and the recent high profile InfluenceMap âIMO corporate captureâ report, suggests the shipping industry lobbyists are driving decisions – and this seems to be another of those.
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2. Seafarers Training Changing
Current seafarer training is becoming out of step with the quantum leaps in technology seen onboard ships hitting the water these days, a senior figure at the US Coast Guard (USCG) has warned. Speaking at maritime training association GlobalMETâs annual conference in Mumbai on Friday, Mayte Medina, the head of the Office of Merchant Mariner Credentialing at the USCG, told delegates that "todayâs mariners are generalists, whereas tomorrowâs mariners need to be specialists". "Todayâs training processes and delivery systems need to change to meet tomorrowâs needs,â the 20-year veteran of the USCG said.
Current seafarer training is becoming out of step with the quantum leaps in technology seen onboard ships hitting the water these days, a senior figure at the US Coast Guard (USCG) has warned. Speaking at maritime training association GlobalMETâs annual conference in Mumbai on Friday, Mayte Medina, the head of the Office of Merchant Mariner Credentialing at the USCG, told delegates that "todayâs mariners are generalists, whereas tomorrowâs mariners need to be specialists". "Todayâs training processes and delivery systems need to change to meet tomorrowâs needs,â the 20-year veteran of the USCG said.
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3. Secretive Shipping Empire
Wilbur Rossâs shipping empire forms one of the most high profile exposĂ©s in the just released Paradise Papers. Ross, the commerce secretary in the Donald Trump administration, is in hot water for shipping firm Navigatorâs business dealings in Russia with Vladimir Putinâs son-in-law. The Paradise Papers, detailed for the first time on Sunday, are a leak of 13.4m files from two offshore service providers and 19 tax havensâ company registries. Ross has a stake in Navigator Holdings, which has contracts with Sibur, a a Russian gas company part-owned by Kirill Shamalov, the husband of Putinâs daughter Katerina Tikhonova.
Wilbur Rossâs shipping empire forms one of the most high profile exposĂ©s in the just released Paradise Papers. Ross, the commerce secretary in the Donald Trump administration, is in hot water for shipping firm Navigatorâs business dealings in Russia with Vladimir Putinâs son-in-law. The Paradise Papers, detailed for the first time on Sunday, are a leak of 13.4m files from two offshore service providers and 19 tax havensâ company registries. Ross has a stake in Navigator Holdings, which has contracts with Sibur, a a Russian gas company part-owned by Kirill Shamalov, the husband of Putinâs daughter Katerina Tikhonova.
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4. Maersk New Appointment
Maersk Container Industry has appointed Sean Fitzgerald as chief executive. Maersk Container Industry is part of Maerskâs transport and logistics division, developing and manufacturing both dry and refrigerated containers. Fitzgerald moves from his role of president at Joy Global China, part of the Japanese manufacturing company Komatsu Mining, and has previously held numerous executive positions at General Electric. Fitzgerald will be responsible for the strategic direction and the entire operations of the companyâs three container manufacturing plants in Chile and China as well as its R&D centre in Denmark.
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5. UNCTAD Shipping In Numbers
The UNCTAD Review of Maritime Transport 2017 offers a snapshot of the world fleet which, valued at $829 billion. The top five shipowners in terms of cargo carrying capacity (dwt) are Greece (309 million dwt), Japan, China, Germany and Singapore. Together, these five countries have a market share of 49.5 percent of dwt. Only one country from Latin America, Brazil, is among the top 35 shipowning countries; none are from Africa. In terms of vessel numbers, China is the leading shipowning country, the share of shipowning by the traditional maritime nations in Europe and North America has continued to decrease.
The UNCTAD Review of Maritime Transport 2017 offers a snapshot of the world fleet which, valued at $829 billion. The top five shipowners in terms of cargo carrying capacity (dwt) are Greece (309 million dwt), Japan, China, Germany and Singapore. Together, these five countries have a market share of 49.5 percent of dwt. Only one country from Latin America, Brazil, is among the top 35 shipowning countries; none are from Africa. In terms of vessel numbers, China is the leading shipowning country, the share of shipowning by the traditional maritime nations in Europe and North America has continued to decrease.
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6. Sentencing for Cruise Drug Smuggler
Cruise ship passenger Isabelle Lagace, 29, has been sentenced to 7.5 years in an Australian prison for attempting to import $21 million in cocaine in her baggage. In combination with drugs seized from her companions, it was the largest single cocaine bust on a passenger vessel in Australian history. Lagace, a Canadian national, arrived in Australia on the cruise ship Sea Princess on August 29, 2016, at the end of a world tour. She boarded in Dover and cruised to Ireland, Bermuda, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru and Chile, posting photos of her journey to her Instagram account along the way.
Cruise ship passenger Isabelle Lagace, 29, has been sentenced to 7.5 years in an Australian prison for attempting to import $21 million in cocaine in her baggage. In combination with drugs seized from her companions, it was the largest single cocaine bust on a passenger vessel in Australian history. Lagace, a Canadian national, arrived in Australia on the cruise ship Sea Princess on August 29, 2016, at the end of a world tour. She boarded in Dover and cruised to Ireland, Bermuda, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru and Chile, posting photos of her journey to her Instagram account along the way.
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7. Iranian Ship Grounded
The 4,922-teu Iran-flagged containership "Touska" ran aground on a tiny islet off the southwest coast of main Hong Kong island on Sunday night. According to vessel tracking services, the fully laden IRISL-operated ship was in transit from Kaohsiung and bound for Shenzhen when it apparently strayed off the East Lamma Channel at about 2100 hrs, and ran aground on the well-marked Magazine Island to the north of the busy shipping lane, which comprises part of the traffic separation scheme leading into Hong Kong Port and the Pearl River Delta.
The 4,922-teu Iran-flagged containership "Touska" ran aground on a tiny islet off the southwest coast of main Hong Kong island on Sunday night. According to vessel tracking services, the fully laden IRISL-operated ship was in transit from Kaohsiung and bound for Shenzhen when it apparently strayed off the East Lamma Channel at about 2100 hrs, and ran aground on the well-marked Magazine Island to the north of the busy shipping lane, which comprises part of the traffic separation scheme leading into Hong Kong Port and the Pearl River Delta.
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8. Investigation into Box Loss
The UK Marine Accident Investigation Board (MAIB) has launched an investigation into the loss of over 40 containers from the 2006-built containership Ever Smart. The incident occurred while the UK-flagged vessel was sailing some 700 nautical miles east of Japan on October 30, MAIB informed, adding that a total of 42 containers fell overboard. Media reports indicate that inclement weather conditions on the shipâs route in the northwestern Pacific could have lead to the loss of boxes. Ever Smart was on its way from the port of Taipei, Taiwan to US port of Los Angeles.
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9. Magic Island Maker Revealed
China has unveiled a massive dredger, which has been called âa magic island-makerâ by its designer and is considered the most powerful vessel of its type in Asia, the state media reported. Named "Tian Kun Hao", the ship is reported to have a deck the size of nine basketball courts and be capable of dredging up to 6,000 cubic meters an hour and digging as deep as 35 meters under the sea floor. The ship, capable of building artificial islands of the sort the country has constructed in the contested South China Sea, is funded and designed by Tianjin Dredging Co Ltd, associated with China Communication Construction Co Ltd.
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10. Cyber Type Approval Granted
With cyber security a very real and growing problem for the maritime industry Kongsberg has received the first type approval from DNV GL to address the issue. Classification society DNV GL has given cyber security type approval for Kongsbergâs K-IMS system. The type approval programme focuses on verifying both the technical reliability and cyber security of control systems. The new âSecurity Assessment of Control System Componentsâ type approval programme, is a rigorous certification regime to demonstrate the cyber security capability of onboard systems. Let’s hope the crew keep the systems updated…
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Daily news feed from Seacurus Ltd â providers of MLC crew insurance solutions www.seacurus.com
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S Jones
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