Maritime insurers join drive to improve cargo safety

Launched in February 2023, the initiative is a multi-year collaborative technology acceleration programme focused on reducing cargo fires and loss in maritime and its impact.

“Fires on board container ships keep happening, with depressing regularity, often resulting in tragic loss of life and catastrophic damage to ship and cargo. A large proportion of these fires are completely preventable, and we find that losses could have been mitigated by better practices,” said Stuart Edmonston, loss prevention director at UK P&I Club.

“This is an industry-wide problem that requires collaboration. The only way to improve safety is to work together, share ideas and identify and utilise modern technological solutions.”

Cross sector collaboration

The CFLII is already supported by Anchor Partners COSCO Shipping Lines, Evergreen Line, HMM, Lloyd’s Register, Maersk, the Offen Group, ONE and Seaspan, which represent around 50% of the total liner shipping market.

It is seeking to help expedite the uptake of technology and best practice by identifying specific opportunities where technology can make a difference, shaping joint requirements, identifying technology solutions, undertaking trials and developing best practices and recommendations.

The Initiative has a broad technology scope, encompassing three significant topics of concern. The first relates to onboard cargo control, including whether cargo has been properly loaded, secured and monitored during transit.

Secondly, it aims to tackle onboard fire, the ability to rapidly detect fires and prevent propagation through effective onboard response, particularly on cargo vessels such as container ships and car-carriers. The third topic of concern relates to the challenges created by the increasing scale of vessels.

It has already started working on solutions for early fire detection in cargo holds.