Ocean carriers have suffered numerous onboard blazes in recent years, with devastating effects in some cases, including on the 6,750 teu MSC Flaminia in July 2012 which claimed three lives and forced the ship to be abandoned mid-Atlantic.
One of the biggest concerns for container lines is the danger of fire onboard a ship, often originating from ‘rogue’ containers loaded with goods misdeclared as non-hazardous.
One liner operator recently told The Loadstar that misdeclared hazardous containers were “becoming endemic” in the industry, and those that are identified as misdeclared were probably the “tip of the iceberg”.
In Hamburg Maersk Line executives met with their counterparts at Hapag-Lloyd with a view to implementing a dangerous goods detection system similar to the German carrier’s Watchdog.
As a result of this extra diligence, Hapag-Lloyd said that in 2014 it shut out more than 2,600 shipments as “not being properly declared as dangerous goods”, averting potential catastrophes at sea.
