Cargo operations for a typical container ship involve many parties on board and ashore. While the ship’s captain holds overall responsibilities for the safety of the ship, her cargo and crew, the actual loading/unloading activities are mainly handled by personnel not part of the ship’s complement, such as shippers, charterers, ship planners, stevedores, etc.
Ship planners usually hold competencies related to ship’s structures, stability, safety, and international rules and codes, and are conversant with sophisticated software and programs for loading/discharging cargoes. Stevedores would be on site to confirm that the containers are physically loaded (or discharged) as planned.
However, some other requirements may be inadvertently overlooked during the actual cargo operations. This proliferates the risk of accidents/damages to the cargo and/or ship.
This project sees to two such requirements, which are:
a) Verification/confirmation of each loading (container count).
b) Verification/confirmation of sufficient minimum amount of underdeck clearance for top-most tier of containers loaded in the hold.
This is the vertical height of the space between the bottom of the hatch cover and the highest point of the top tier containers.