IMO begins new rule on container safety

The International Maritime Organisation (IMO) has begun the implementation of a new rule requiring the verification of the gross mass of a container before it is loaded onto a ship.

The new rule is to ensure that containers are well stowed, thereby preventing their collapse and loss overboard, as well as the associated injury and loss of lives.

An estimated 170 million containers of commodities and consumer goods are being shipped to billions of people around the world yearly. Following concerns by member-states and the shipping industry sequel to a number of incidents, the IMO started developing measures against their loss in 2011.

According to the agency, “the aim was to develop further measures to complement the existing provisions aimed at the stability and safe operation of ships, including the safe packing, handling and transport of containers.”

Key to achieving this is the verification of the mass of a packed container to complement the existing requirement to declare the gross mass of cargo and containers. This involves “weighing the packed container using calibrated and certified equipment.”

The alternative is to weigh “all packages and cargo items, including the mass of pallets, dunnage and other securing material to be packed in the container and adding the tare mass of the container to the sum of the single masses, using a certified method approved by the competent authority of the state in which packing of the container was completed.”

The shipper must ensure that the verified gross mass of each packed container is stated in the shipping document which, signed by the shipper or his representative, must be submitted to the master or his representative, and to the terminal representative in good time for the ship stowage plan to be drawn up, else the container shall not be loaded onto the ship.