A group of liner operators and containership owners have come together to find better ways to fight fires on boxships.
The move follows a spate of high-profile blazes involving containerships, including the 10,106-teu APL Le Havre (built 2012), which caught fire off the coast of India on 9 August.
“These are the very big cases,” said Claas-Heye Diekmann, head of the Hamburg-based Container Ship Safety Forum (CSSF), which is spearheading the firefighting project.
“There are some more cases that are not really coming to public [attention].”
CSSF, whose members account for 40% of the global boxship fleet, will focus on fighting fires inside containers that may be difficult to reach.
Its largest member, Maersk Line of Denmark, is testing equipment designed to fight fires inside a container that is stacked six or seven tiers high.
The results will be shared at the next meeting of the CSSF in Copenhagen on 19 November.
Concern about fires onboard containerships has spiked following a spate of incidents this year, including on the 9,300-teu APL Vancouver (built 2013), 5,754-teu ER Kobe (built 2001), 56,642-gt Grande America (built 1997) and 7,250-teu Yantian Express (built 2002).
That has led some liner operators, including Hapag-Lloyd, to take a hard-line approach with shippers over the misdeclaration of dangerous goods aboard containerships.
The CSSF, formed in 2014 with just seven members, gained its 24th member this year.
New members include Asiatic Lloyd & Atlantic Lloyd, Arkas Shipping & Transport, Lomar Shipping, V.Ships and Reederei Nord.
They join founding members including CMA CGM, Maersk Line, Hamburg Sud, Costamare, ER Schiffahrt, Rickmers Group and Zodiac Maritime.
