General Cargo Ships and Safety

During the last hundred years shipping, like other forms of transport has undergone great changes. Until the end of the last century most goods at sea were carried in packaged form. Grain, for example, was carried in sacks and cotton in bales. Very few liquids were carried at all, but those that were - including oil - were usually carried in barrels. Cargoes in fact were carried in much the same way as they always had been. Today everything has changed. Oil is the major commodity carried at sea in bulk; so are grain, coal and other minerals. Containerization is now common and the general cargo ship has in many trades been replaced by specialized vessels such as container ships, ro-ro ships and car carriers among others.

 

Virtually all liquids transported by sea - such as crude oil and finished petroleum products - are carried in bulk, and tankers now form by far the greatest percentage of the world fleet of merchant ships. The second biggest group consists of solid bulk cargo carriers. The goods carried in this way include coal, grains, ores, concentrates, fertilizers and animal feeds. From the shippers' point of view bulk carriage has numerous advantages. A bulk cargo can be loaded and unloaded far more quickly than one that is unitized, thereby leading to great savings in time and money. However, there are a number of dangers in the carriage of bulk cargoes which include the following:

 

1. Improper weight distribution resulting in structural damage. This can be caused by putting too much weight on the inner bottom of the ship or by wrongly distributing the cargo between holds, leading to excessive stresses on the ship's structure. 2. Improper stability and cargo shift. Another result of improper loading can be excessive stability. This leads to the normal rolls of the ship becoming shorter but much more violent. Apart from being extremely uncomfortable for those on board, this can in turn lead to damage to the ship's structure.