A container ship lost a record 1,800 containers(one-apus-container-incident.com)
one-apus-container-incident.com
A container ship lost a record 1,800 containers
https://www.one-apus-container-incident.com/
308 comments
I’ve heard from some people involved in the shipping industry that (based on the size of the incident) this ship is probably going to declare General Average, which is a sort of weird concept that AFAIK doesn’t really have a parallel on land. It’s basically, “we’ve lost an awful lot of cargo—everyone who had stuff on board, chip in to pay for what got lost.” From what I understand, the idea is that you don’t want to waste time in an emergency trying to figure out which cargo is OK to jettison, so the shippers whose stuff arrived safely pay the ones who didn’t for their sacrifice, but I imagine it can be quite the surprise bill.
I may be misremembering, but from how I understood container shipping works, that is always the case with lost / damaged containers, no matter the size of the event. If only one container falls off the boat, all entities who were shipping things on that boat are required to chip in proportionally to the amount of containers they were shipping, to make the owner of that container whole.
The idea being that otherwise it's not fair to the owners of the top level containers, which have a higher chance of falling off than the bottom level containers. Everyone's share of the boat is equal.
For this reason you always want to take the insurance that is offered against this, just in case that one container contained something worth a few million, and suddenly you're on the hook to pay an amount that is a multiple of what you were shipping in the first place.
The idea being that otherwise it's not fair to the owners of the top level containers, which have a higher chance of falling off than the bottom level containers. Everyone's share of the boat is equal.
For this reason you always want to take the insurance that is offered against this, just in case that one container contained something worth a few million, and suddenly you're on the hook to pay an amount that is a multiple of what you were shipping in the first place.
From some rudimenatary googling it's based on the value of the goods. So unless your cargo is expensive you wouldn't pay nearly as much. Unless there were expenditures there's no way you would be out more than its worth. Also because if this they'd likely load extremely valuable cargo in positions were it's not likely to be lost or jettisoned.
Shows quite nice how important it is to really understand your Incoterms. And to procure insurance to cover any risk left open.
> The idea being that otherwise it's not fair to the owners of the top level containers, which have a higher chance of falling off than the bottom level containers. Everyone's share of the boat is equal.
In general, being able to charge different prices to different customers is very beneficial to the seller. So should we expect this to change as ship operators figure out more sophisticated pricing models?
In general, being able to charge different prices to different customers is very beneficial to the seller. So should we expect this to change as ship operators figure out more sophisticated pricing models?
I always thought part of the advantage that shipping containers brought was that they were more or less interchangeable. And that meant that they could be loaded in whatever manner best suited the whole ship. The details of which might not be known at the time when the container was booked. The carrier might be able to reserve “interior” or “top level” spaces for a different prices, but with shipments being loaded/offloaded at different ports, the logistics of loading can be quite complicated. If your container need to be offloaded at the first of three ports, you probably couldn’t have the option of an interior space. Or if you had an extremely heavy container, that should be loaded in the lower part of the ship for safety.
My guess is that the orchestration of how containers are loaded is complex enough that the order of stacking is best left up to the shipper and adding cost/location optimization to the equation might make things too complicated. The containers should be loaded in the manner that is the safest and most efficient for unloading.
My guess is that the orchestration of how containers are loaded is complex enough that the order of stacking is best left up to the shipper and adding cost/location optimization to the equation might make things too complicated. The containers should be loaded in the manner that is the safest and most efficient for unloading.
> Or if you had an extremely heavy container, that should be loaded in the lower part of the ship for safety.
By the way the standard ISO 668 intermodal container has a total limit of about three tonnes; the unusual, heaviest size is about ten tonnes. A container port won’t be prepared to handle anything heavier or even, in practice, the 10 tonne version. These constraints apply to the rest of the system (roads, trucks etc — they are “intermodal” after all) so anything outside these constraints (wind turbine planes, major ship engine blocks etc) isn’t containerized anyway.
In other words the point of containerization is to be able to ignore these distinctions. If you care, you ship as if it weren’t in a container
By the way the standard ISO 668 intermodal container has a total limit of about three tonnes; the unusual, heaviest size is about ten tonnes. A container port won’t be prepared to handle anything heavier or even, in practice, the 10 tonne version. These constraints apply to the rest of the system (roads, trucks etc — they are “intermodal” after all) so anything outside these constraints (wind turbine planes, major ship engine blocks etc) isn’t containerized anyway.
In other words the point of containerization is to be able to ignore these distinctions. If you care, you ship as if it weren’t in a container
Oh, just because you can ignore some distinctions doesn't mean that you will.
If a shipping operator can eke out a few extra percent of efficiency by taking container weight into account, they will try to do so.
Of course, they will have to balance the efficiency gains against extra complexity.
But it's not so different from eg Amazon taking what's going on inside the AWS VMs into account when deciding on how to run their data centre.
Eg you might have booked a VM with four cores, but if you are typically only using one, they'll take that into account during placement.
If a shipping operator can eke out a few extra percent of efficiency by taking container weight into account, they will try to do so.
Of course, they will have to balance the efficiency gains against extra complexity.
But it's not so different from eg Amazon taking what's going on inside the AWS VMs into account when deciding on how to run their data centre.
Eg you might have booked a VM with four cores, but if you are typically only using one, they'll take that into account during placement.
3 tons is tiny. An empty shipping container weighs at least 2 tons.
The actual ISO 668 limit seems to be 30 tons.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermodal_container
The actual ISO 668 limit seems to be 30 tons.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermodal_container
I'm sure it's just a level of optimization that's hard to solve because of a few reasons. a) it's a fairly hard technology problem. Large container ships can carry 20k containers. If each of those has a spot, and you have to optimize, the search space is suddenly looking like 20,000!, which is just a wildly big number. So assuming you have some sort of technological solution and know where every container should go, b) you need to move all the logistics around so that containers arrive in the correct order to get loaded in the correct spots.
You need to do all this just to massively increase the complexity of your billing model to offer slightly different rates of insurance. I'm sure there are teams looking at ways to make this better (just stipulate in the contract that any super valuable containers arrive early so they're loaded lower), but this is a HARD problem to solve completely.
You need to do all this just to massively increase the complexity of your billing model to offer slightly different rates of insurance. I'm sure there are teams looking at ways to make this better (just stipulate in the contract that any super valuable containers arrive early so they're loaded lower), but this is a HARD problem to solve completely.
A big search space is not a detriment to optimization. It just keeps you from reaching provable optimality, but doesn't keep you from saving on costs compared to doing nothing.
Same for the rest of what you describe: yes, a perfect system would be a lot of hassle, but making any effort at all is sure to yield benefits.
You don't need to change the billing model necessarily. The customers don't have to know that you are doing this kind of optimization.
Of course, the more you can expose incentives to your customers, the more efficient you can get.
But even if your containers arrive in arbitrary order and you have to make your decisions on where to place them 'online', ie before the next container arrives; as long as you have any choice left at all, you can try your hand at optimization techniques.
Same for the rest of what you describe: yes, a perfect system would be a lot of hassle, but making any effort at all is sure to yield benefits.
You don't need to change the billing model necessarily. The customers don't have to know that you are doing this kind of optimization.
Of course, the more you can expose incentives to your customers, the more efficient you can get.
But even if your containers arrive in arbitrary order and you have to make your decisions on where to place them 'online', ie before the next container arrives; as long as you have any choice left at all, you can try your hand at optimization techniques.
I'm not an expert on ocean shipping by any means, but I would assume that cargo value is such a low priority when it comes to determine loading strategies that you would only need to optimize around a local area of maybe 100 containers. Which would not make it a hard problem at all but it could be pretty pointless depending on how many containers go overboard in a typical "lost container" event.
Also, consider that from the point of view of the people loading the ship, it's all insured. And if you didn't get the insurance then you understand the risk. Why would they care? They aren't the insurance company. What's their incentive?
Also, consider that from the point of view of the people loading the ship, it's all insured. And if you didn't get the insurance then you understand the risk. Why would they care? They aren't the insurance company. What's their incentive?
This is such a HN thread..
The same effort is better invested into making sure you are not losing containers.
It's like saying 'we can optimise policing so that stabbings only happen to the right people'
The same effort is better invested into making sure you are not losing containers.
It's like saying 'we can optimise policing so that stabbings only happen to the right people'
Do you think that doesn’t happen? Police departments absolutely prioritize certain areas over others - Places where crime is unlikely to happen but should be dealt with swiftly, places where crime is very likely to happen and they have resources on-hand. The net losers tend to be “The Average Person”, for whom police response times in event of a burglary or domestic incident is measured in tens and fifteens of minutes rather than fives.
Even “Even spread” would be a serious topic of debate - Even spread over what? Geographic area? Residency? Where people are likely to be at a given time? Those are three radically different answers in any commuter city.
Even “Even spread” would be a serious topic of debate - Even spread over what? Geographic area? Residency? Where people are likely to be at a given time? Those are three radically different answers in any commuter city.
I guess that would mean they have to distinguish between containers when loading them onto the ship. That's probably difficult and more expensive for everyone.
Wow, this is sobering information. I shipped a car from the UK to the US several years ago. I purchased shipping insurance on the container and car. And watched nervously from afar as I tracked it online when possible. I had no idea there was any possibility I could have any liability for others losses. If I understand this correctly...
I wonder when it becomes more economical to load top level containers with cheap goods and keep the multi-million-dollar containers somewhere safer.
You'd need some significant automation and integration with all the port-side trucks, forklifts, and cranes that unload and load your ship to make sure that containers arrive and depart in the right order. You could then offer customers lower insurance premiums (or let them pay more for interior space) because average loss would be reduced. But that would take a huge amount of vertical integration or an industry-wide cooperation effort and cost sensitivity that I don't think is present.
You'd need some significant automation and integration with all the port-side trucks, forklifts, and cranes that unload and load your ship to make sure that containers arrive and depart in the right order. You could then offer customers lower insurance premiums (or let them pay more for interior space) because average loss would be reduced. But that would take a huge amount of vertical integration or an industry-wide cooperation effort and cost sensitivity that I don't think is present.
Loading is already very complex and takes special knowledge and more and more software to balance the ship and keep the loading-process efficient. Dangerous goods are separated from the quarters as much as possible for example. I'm sure the process already includes variables like value.
But I also assume that overall, unless we talk about unique items like artwork, not enough containers are lost to put much weight on the value of the contents compared to everything else.
But I also assume that overall, unless we talk about unique items like artwork, not enough containers are lost to put much weight on the value of the contents compared to everything else.
Can confirm this. The concept is not as weird as it sounds once you consider that the ship's captain is a naval officer who has duties and a social role roughly similar to that of a doctor. For any task related to navigating/operating the vessel (emergency or not), the captain's word is final and there are penalties for negligent behavior that are determined completely outside of the "corporate" chain of command. Decisions of whether or not to ditch a block of unstable containers are made with 0 interference from commercial interests.
The captain is also the one responsible for upholding the laws of whatever flag the vessel flies under.
The captain is also the one responsible for upholding the laws of whatever flag the vessel flies under.
> Decisions of whether or not to ditch a block of unstable containers are made with 0 interference from commercial interests.
Or rather, the commercial interest operates in the long run and influences the mechanisms through which decisions are made.
The concepts of eg general average or making the captain's word final were developed very much in correspondence to commercial necessity.
In some sense your analogy to a doctor is apt. Individual medical decisions might not look much at costs, but the system as a whole ignores costs at its own peril.
Or rather, the commercial interest operates in the long run and influences the mechanisms through which decisions are made.
The concepts of eg general average or making the captain's word final were developed very much in correspondence to commercial necessity.
In some sense your analogy to a doctor is apt. Individual medical decisions might not look much at costs, but the system as a whole ignores costs at its own peril.
Sounds sort of like a post-hoc insurance plan. Everybody "pays in" by accepting the risk of lost cargo, and the payout averages out the losses on that individual ship. If a ship is large enough, then that may be sufficient spreading of the risk.
> sort of like a post-hoc insurance plan
Actually a mutual insurance policy, since the insurers and insured are the same group of people.
Actually a mutual insurance policy, since the insurers and insured are the same group of people.
P&I clubs. Just learned about these a few days ago. Interesting part of the shipping industry I hadn’t heard about.
Wouldn't it make more sense to pay the insurance up front, though? Or at least reserve money for it up front?
Depends on how well it's averaged. If you want to create a proper ex-ante insurance policy, you need underwriters, you need lawyers, you need adjusters, you need to determine premiums, collect premiums, pool the money, and then distribute it. These people all need to be paid, and so you must charge a premium over the actual cost.
Or, you can take the total lost cargo, divide it by the total value shipped, and send a QuickBooks invoice to everyone.
So long as the risk pool is large enough, and everyone involved is fairly trustworthy, it makes sense. Definitely unparalleled on land, to my knowledge!
Or, you can take the total lost cargo, divide it by the total value shipped, and send a QuickBooks invoice to everyone.
So long as the risk pool is large enough, and everyone involved is fairly trustworthy, it makes sense. Definitely unparalleled on land, to my knowledge!
Why does doing it upfront require so many people, and doing it afterwards doesn't? You could just have a standard formula for upfront insurance?
Who's going to figure out how much to charge? :)
The standard formula?
Got a link? ;) Actuaries hate him!
Well the industry would have to make a one-time investment to determine the formula.
Upfront you don't know how much, if anything, will be lost.
But everybody knows the value of their goods?
Do you have a point? Because it sounds like you're suggesting regular insurance, which answers your original question.
But to take regular insurance, you don't need all those complicated things. I have for example a travel health insurance that only requires me to send a fixed amount of money to their bank account, instant insurance.
Yeah my point is/was that you can just use regular insurance. That's my point. Or at least I don't see why not. Presumably the shipping industry has a reason.
Yeah my point is/was that you can just use regular insurance. That's my point. Or at least I don't see why not. Presumably the shipping industry has a reason.
> But to take regular insurance, you don't need all those complicated things. I have for example a travel health insurance that only requires me to send a fixed amount of money to their bank account, instant insurance.
Long story short: your travel insurance has all those complicated things, and you pay for it. And you also pay for the convenience of not seeing that complexity.
The cost of explicitly covering only costs incurred on accidents, like in the shipping industry OP case, would give you a much much lower cost on your travel insurance (technically no longer an insurance). But then you would have to pay irregular amounts on irregular occasions. You also pay a premium to get a fixed budgetable amount.
Long story short: your travel insurance has all those complicated things, and you pay for it. And you also pay for the convenience of not seeing that complexity.
The cost of explicitly covering only costs incurred on accidents, like in the shipping industry OP case, would give you a much much lower cost on your travel insurance (technically no longer an insurance). But then you would have to pay irregular amounts on irregular occasions. You also pay a premium to get a fixed budgetable amount.
Why does it have to be a premium for getting a fixed budgetable amount?
If they ship millions of containers, surely they can work out an efficient solution.
Yes, at some point they need a lawyer and what not. But not every single time somebody wants to ship a container. They work it out once and that's it. Even if the lawyer costs 100 million dollars, if they ship millions of containers every year, they can scale the cost down to one dollar per container in the end.
The system to only ask for money in case of accidents doesn't actually make it cheaper or less complicated. There simply is the inherent "cost" (a ka expected loss) of accidents, that you have to pay one way or another. There may also be people who don't want to pay, and then you still need your lawyer.
My travel insurance is very cheap, by the way.
Insurance is an old and established business, many learnings already exists. The industry presumably is quite good at estimating and pricing risks.
If they ship millions of containers, surely they can work out an efficient solution.
Yes, at some point they need a lawyer and what not. But not every single time somebody wants to ship a container. They work it out once and that's it. Even if the lawyer costs 100 million dollars, if they ship millions of containers every year, they can scale the cost down to one dollar per container in the end.
The system to only ask for money in case of accidents doesn't actually make it cheaper or less complicated. There simply is the inherent "cost" (a ka expected loss) of accidents, that you have to pay one way or another. There may also be people who don't want to pay, and then you still need your lawyer.
My travel insurance is very cheap, by the way.
Insurance is an old and established business, many learnings already exists. The industry presumably is quite good at estimating and pricing risks.
Not everyone involved needs to be trustworthy.
Eg the shipping operator doesn't have to trust the customers: possession in nine tenths of the law, and the former already possess the latter's cargo.
Similar, the declaration of value is somewhat self-enforcing: if you declare a high value, you get paid out more if your stuff drops into the ocean. But you also pay a bigger share, if someone else's containers drop in the ocean.
Eg the shipping operator doesn't have to trust the customers: possession in nine tenths of the law, and the former already possess the latter's cargo.
Similar, the declaration of value is somewhat self-enforcing: if you declare a high value, you get paid out more if your stuff drops into the ocean. But you also pay a bigger share, if someone else's containers drop in the ocean.
If you have a million containers you’ll be transporting every year insuring all of them is pointless you may as well just be your own insurer and take the hit when things go wrong. It largely will work out cheaper as there is no middle man and you have loads of money from your successful business to dip into should you lose a few.
Doesn't matter who does the insuring (external company or shipping company itself), the point is still that it would be better to have the insurance up front, instead of this risk of additional costs of arbitrary height?
And you can reach out to a (re-)insurer to cover losses that exceed some threshold.
As a society we should vote for car insurance work this way too instead of feeding fraudulent car insurance industry.
Can you describe what exactly is wrong about the current car insurance industry? It sounds like this is exactly how car insurance currently works and it's a very regulated industry, perhaps only behind the financial industry and car manufacturing itself.
Quebec has quite an interesting system. Everyone must pay in the same national car insurance. You are unable to sue anyone for what happened to you on the road, if you get hurt, the insurance pays you a standard amount for the injury and that's it. So it overall reduce the burden on the court system and the insurance self-finance itself, there's no need for profits. Quebec has the lowest cost car insurance in Canada (and may be North America?)
Oh, interesting. I expect this is also easier in a country with single-payer health care. In the US, the majority of the cost of car insurance is for long-term medical care that may be needed after a crash.
NZ does the same thing for accident insurance of all kinds. Not perfect but generally works really well. The insurer does a huge about of work in accident prevention and even covers visitors accident, even ones like ski injuries.
Makes it really easy to do sport there and great for public health as a result.
Makes it really easy to do sport there and great for public health as a result.
> So it overall reduce the burden on the court system and the insurance self-finance itself, there's no need for profits.
Profit is seldom a significant part of costs. Slate Star Codex went into that quite a bit in the context of healthcare.
Cost explosions usually come when controls on costs are missing.
Competition can be one way to control costs, but it's not the only one. Eg tap water in most places or the Quebec insurance you mention are low cost, too.
Profit is seldom a significant part of costs. Slate Star Codex went into that quite a bit in the context of healthcare.
Cost explosions usually come when controls on costs are missing.
Competition can be one way to control costs, but it's not the only one. Eg tap water in most places or the Quebec insurance you mention are low cost, too.
I have no idea what the comment you replied to had to complain about.
However: an industry being heavily regulated often means that it's not well run for the customers. Just the opposite.
The insurance arrangements in global shipping are likely under lighter regulation than most countries' car insurance.
Btw, in general insurance doesn't have to work on the basis of formal averaging. Averaging can just be a useful and simple shortcut in certain situations (or when the law requires it).
But in principle, each individual insurance contract is an independent bet and can be valued individually.
Goldman Sachs or someone at Lloyds will be happy to sell you insurance for arbitrary one-off risks, as long as you are happy to pay them enough.
See eg Warren Buffett's March Madness competition https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1931210-warren-buffet-wi...
In essence, if you could have predicted enough basketball results, Warren Buffett would have given you a billion dollars.
That was a special, one-off risks to Warren Buffett if every there was one. But it's rather simple to price and write an insurance contract for.
However: an industry being heavily regulated often means that it's not well run for the customers. Just the opposite.
The insurance arrangements in global shipping are likely under lighter regulation than most countries' car insurance.
Btw, in general insurance doesn't have to work on the basis of formal averaging. Averaging can just be a useful and simple shortcut in certain situations (or when the law requires it).
But in principle, each individual insurance contract is an independent bet and can be valued individually.
Goldman Sachs or someone at Lloyds will be happy to sell you insurance for arbitrary one-off risks, as long as you are happy to pay them enough.
See eg Warren Buffett's March Madness competition https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1931210-warren-buffet-wi...
In essence, if you could have predicted enough basketball results, Warren Buffett would have given you a billion dollars.
That was a special, one-off risks to Warren Buffett if every there was one. But it's rather simple to price and write an insurance contract for.
In the true market "ship" model you'd pay 1/10 of what you're paying now. In the government enforced model you're overpaying 10x+ fold.
Car insurance is an extremely competitive market which is the opposite of a monopoly. Food is also ‘mandated’ by basic biology but still ends up being available for cheap.
Food is cheap and available in America -- the cheapest in the world as a fraction of income -- because of government intervention. For example, the continuous re-authorization of the Farm Bill means that corn is sold at below the cost to produce.
Food is highly government-subsidized in America. In fact, subsidies accounted for 25% of all farm income in America in 2016 [2].
[1] https://www.ibtimes.com/us-spends-less-food-any-other-countr...
[2] https://modernfarmer.com/2019/01/congress-finally-passed-a-n...
Food is highly government-subsidized in America. In fact, subsidies accounted for 25% of all farm income in America in 2016 [2].
[1] https://www.ibtimes.com/us-spends-less-food-any-other-countr...
[2] https://modernfarmer.com/2019/01/congress-finally-passed-a-n...
Farms are only getting a small fraction of the price of food (https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/price-spreads-from-fa...). When you combine this factor with your stat, it doesn't seem like subsidies are a significant factor in the price of food to individuals.
Bulk rice for example costs ~500$ per metric ton so 22 cents per lb for 1696 calories, removing a 25% subsidy bumps that to 29 cents. Even buying in “bulk” adds overhead, but you’re paying a premium on S&H not so much the food.
That’s roughly how people can live on “a dollar a day” you can get a days worth of food for well under 1$.
That’s roughly how people can live on “a dollar a day” you can get a days worth of food for well under 1$.
You are right that subsidies make up 25% of farm income, but that doesn't mean that food is anything like eg 25% cheaper than without subsidies.
The exact impact depends on many details. By default, you would mostly expect food subsidies to increase the price that agricultural land fetches.
Most subsidies would only have an impact on prices, if they encourage more growing overall.
Of course, there's also subsidies and regulations for producing less food. (The EU has a lot of these, too. It's almost impossible to grow more grapes for wine.) The US has the famous corn ethanol subsidy. And some tariffs on food imports.
The exact impact depends on many details. By default, you would mostly expect food subsidies to increase the price that agricultural land fetches.
Most subsidies would only have an impact on prices, if they encourage more growing overall.
Of course, there's also subsidies and regulations for producing less food. (The EU has a lot of these, too. It's almost impossible to grow more grapes for wine.) The US has the famous corn ethanol subsidy. And some tariffs on food imports.
1) Food is cheap and available in other countries without such government largesse
2) The subsidies alone wouldn't keep prices down if the the evil capitalists were able to control prices as effectively as you seem to imagine.
2) The subsidies alone wouldn't keep prices down if the the evil capitalists were able to control prices as effectively as you seem to imagine.
Out of genuine curiosity which country do you think isn’t involved in their country’s food supply? I can’t imagine any government staying out of something so core to a nations id. I’m asking though, I’m not sure!
I’m very much opposed to the farm bill in current form, but because I oppose the industrial agricultural practices which it supports - and the processed food such dirt cheap corn yields. I think food could stand to be more expensive for all but those least able to afford it. America wastes 30-40% of all food produced according to the FDA [1]. The waste alone is enough to feed most of the human population. But I digress.
With that said my understanding of the farm bill is that one of the pillar purposes of its creation by FDR in the new deal was to control the cost of food.
[1] https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs
I’m very much opposed to the farm bill in current form, but because I oppose the industrial agricultural practices which it supports - and the processed food such dirt cheap corn yields. I think food could stand to be more expensive for all but those least able to afford it. America wastes 30-40% of all food produced according to the FDA [1]. The waste alone is enough to feed most of the human population. But I digress.
With that said my understanding of the farm bill is that one of the pillar purposes of its creation by FDR in the new deal was to control the cost of food.
[1] https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs
> Out of genuine curiosity which country do you think isn’t involved in their country’s food supply? I can’t imagine any government staying out of something so core to a nations id. I’m asking though, I’m not sure!
I suggest looking around the world in space, but also looking through history in time.
Around the world: look at countries that don't produce much food of their own, but import a lot instead. Those countries might still have food regulation, but they won't have a local food growers lobby asking for subsidies.
Throughout history: Have a look at eg the British Corn Laws and the aftermath of their repeal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_Laws
> With that said my understanding of the farm bill is that one of the pillar purposes of its creation by FDR in the new deal was to control the cost of food.
Much of the New Deal was meant to increase the price of (agricultural) products.
I suggest looking around the world in space, but also looking through history in time.
Around the world: look at countries that don't produce much food of their own, but import a lot instead. Those countries might still have food regulation, but they won't have a local food growers lobby asking for subsidies.
Throughout history: Have a look at eg the British Corn Laws and the aftermath of their repeal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_Laws
> With that said my understanding of the farm bill is that one of the pillar purposes of its creation by FDR in the new deal was to control the cost of food.
Much of the New Deal was meant to increase the price of (agricultural) products.
Food is cheap and available in other countries without such government largesse BECAUSE the USA keeps costs down by being the breadbasket of the world and keeping continuous overproduction going.
Indeed in its most blatant form it's called dumping. [1]
[1] https://www.iatp.org/news/us-dumping-corn-in-canada-growers-...
[1] https://www.iatp.org/news/us-dumping-corn-in-canada-growers-...
Yes, though dumping is a bit of a silly concept.
Dumping is much bedeviled by economic policy makers, but it's never actually been a problem for any recipient country to get good stuff for less.
Most complaints about dumping are just protectionism against lower cost producers. (Though not all, as the example with subsidies shows. But if foreign tax payers are happy to pay for cheap goods for us, who are we to complain?)
Dumping is much bedeviled by economic policy makers, but it's never actually been a problem for any recipient country to get good stuff for less.
Most complaints about dumping are just protectionism against lower cost producers. (Though not all, as the example with subsidies shows. But if foreign tax payers are happy to pay for cheap goods for us, who are we to complain?)
Yes if dumping was a continuous practice then we'd all be living off the largess of the dumpers, but it's a temporary practice used to drive out competition before jacking up the prices once dominance is restored. De Beers provide an excellent case study in the application of this tactic.
Yeah, $50 a month for liability insurance always felt like a really fair deal to me. Pleasantly tolerable fee for a day where my car hits black ice and physics takes the wheel
> Pleasantly tolerable fee for a day where my car hits black ice and physics takes the wheel
Hope that day doesn't come because, ironically, liability won't cover your losses. It may, in full or part, cover the incidental loss of others impacted, but not your own.
Hope that day doesn't come because, ironically, liability won't cover your losses. It may, in full or part, cover the incidental loss of others impacted, but not your own.
What do you mean? In the EU every car insurance has to cover minimum 1 million euro in personal liability and 5 million in 3rd party liability. My own with Aviva covers 5 million euro for personal and 20 million for 3rd party. But car insurance typically doesn't pay healthcare bills since healthcare is nationalized, so it's very hard to imagine how payouts would be anywhere near those sums. You'd need to crash into multiple buggati veyrons to get close to the maximum liability limit. I'm paying £400/year.
I don't know about the rest of the EU, but for Germany at least, your assumption is dangerously wrong.
As the party at fault in an accident, you are on the hook for the total amount of damages, no caps or limits, in cases of negligence, intent or "inherent danger" (if you drive a car, hit a pedestrian, and no fault can be found with anyone, the car's driver is on the hook because of the "inherent danger" of the car). The car insurance only covers up to the pre-agreed limits in cases of inherent danger and negligence. For intent, they have to make the victim whole and then get the money back from you.
Healthcare cost will be initially covered by the healthcare provider of the victim in all cases, but if you are found to be legally at fault, the healthcare provider will collect the bill from you or your liability insurance as the party at fault. To the full amount they can extract, no limits. They won't do that for just a few scratches, because usually they don't know what that bill was for until their client tells them about it. But for larger bills, they will inquire and then come to collect. If the collection exceeds the limits of your liability insurance, a court determines intent or you did something else the liability insurance doesn't cover (e.g. non-named driver in limited contracts, knowingly driving a dangerous vehicle, using a vehicle insured as private use in a commercial (Uber) setting) you will pay...
Oh, and in Germany, only liability insurance covering the 3rd party's damages is necessary, the rest is voluntary. Your limits sound about right.
As the party at fault in an accident, you are on the hook for the total amount of damages, no caps or limits, in cases of negligence, intent or "inherent danger" (if you drive a car, hit a pedestrian, and no fault can be found with anyone, the car's driver is on the hook because of the "inherent danger" of the car). The car insurance only covers up to the pre-agreed limits in cases of inherent danger and negligence. For intent, they have to make the victim whole and then get the money back from you.
Healthcare cost will be initially covered by the healthcare provider of the victim in all cases, but if you are found to be legally at fault, the healthcare provider will collect the bill from you or your liability insurance as the party at fault. To the full amount they can extract, no limits. They won't do that for just a few scratches, because usually they don't know what that bill was for until their client tells them about it. But for larger bills, they will inquire and then come to collect. If the collection exceeds the limits of your liability insurance, a court determines intent or you did something else the liability insurance doesn't cover (e.g. non-named driver in limited contracts, knowingly driving a dangerous vehicle, using a vehicle insured as private use in a commercial (Uber) setting) you will pay...
Oh, and in Germany, only liability insurance covering the 3rd party's damages is necessary, the rest is voluntary. Your limits sound about right.
Like I said in my other comment, my wording wasn't correct.
And as for the insurance not paying out if you were negligent or actually acted in an intentional way - that's literally every insurance ever. Your home insurance won't pay out if you leave an open fire inside the house and then go for a walk either - that's negligence. Or if your burning house causes damage to someone else, they will pay them to make them whole, and then try to recover money from you. That's just standard procedure.
I'm just saying that while in the US having to decide your liability limit is a worry of most motorists, I don't know or even heard of anyone ever worrying about this in any EU country I've ever lived in - the minimum limits set by law are very very high already, and most insurers offer even higher ones as standard.
And as for the insurance not paying out if you were negligent or actually acted in an intentional way - that's literally every insurance ever. Your home insurance won't pay out if you leave an open fire inside the house and then go for a walk either - that's negligence. Or if your burning house causes damage to someone else, they will pay them to make them whole, and then try to recover money from you. That's just standard procedure.
I'm just saying that while in the US having to decide your liability limit is a worry of most motorists, I don't know or even heard of anyone ever worrying about this in any EU country I've ever lived in - the minimum limits set by law are very very high already, and most insurers offer even higher ones as standard.
> In the EU every car insurance has to cover minimum 1 million euro in personal liability and 5 million in 3rd party liability.
Source on this? I've always understood you only needed third party insurance, and the EU website [0] seems to back this up.
> it's very hard to imagine how payouts would be anywhere near those sums.
If you kill someone or permanently incapacitate them, you could be on the hook for their lifetime loss of earnings. Here's [1] a family being awarded €650,000 following the death of their mother. Agreed, it's still hard to rack up €20 million and I don't know what the precedent is if you run over a billionaire, but in theory I believe the payout here is uncapped.
[0] https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/vehicles/insurance/val...
[1] https://www.personalinjuryireland.ie/news/fatal-car-crash-in...
Source on this? I've always understood you only needed third party insurance, and the EU website [0] seems to back this up.
> it's very hard to imagine how payouts would be anywhere near those sums.
If you kill someone or permanently incapacitate them, you could be on the hook for their lifetime loss of earnings. Here's [1] a family being awarded €650,000 following the death of their mother. Agreed, it's still hard to rack up €20 million and I don't know what the precedent is if you run over a billionaire, but in theory I believe the payout here is uncapped.
[0] https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/vehicles/insurance/val...
[1] https://www.personalinjuryireland.ie/news/fatal-car-crash-in...
>>Source on this? I've always understood you only needed third party insurance, and the EU website [0] seems to back this up.
Sorry, I suppose I worded it incorrectly. The minimums mandated by the EU are 1 million euro for damages to property, and 5 million euro for damages to persons, and actually, having found the document, even that is not entirely correct - it's 1.2 million euro for damages to property, and 1.2 million for damages to persons per victim up to 6.2 million euro per claim
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM:2016...
Sorry, I suppose I worded it incorrectly. The minimums mandated by the EU are 1 million euro for damages to property, and 5 million euro for damages to persons, and actually, having found the document, even that is not entirely correct - it's 1.2 million euro for damages to property, and 1.2 million for damages to persons per victim up to 6.2 million euro per claim
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM:2016...
I'm not familiar with how EU/UK differentiates "personal liability" from "3rd party liability" and what all that entails. The parent said:
> $50 a month for liability
...so I presumed a resident of the US.
US car insurance policies vary from state to state, so I'll just say how I understand it in layman IANAL terms.
In my state, personal injury protection (PIP) and property damage liability (PDL or commonly just "liability") coverage are the minimum requirements to legally drive a vehicle. There's also bodily injury liability (BIL), but since my state is what's called a "no-fault state", it's not a hard requirement unless you're a taxi (although my coverage bakes it in; I understand this to be applicable towards passengers).
The parent also said:
> Pleasantly tolerable fee for a day where my car hits black ice and physics takes the wheel
In this case, liability coverage as I understand it won't cover damage to the insured's vehicle while driving, which falls under "collision" and is entirely optional for a vehicle that is outright owned (i.e. no lien on the title) in any US state, as far as I'm aware.
So PIP would cover your injuries, PDL would cover damages to the property of others, "collision" covers your property while driving, and this other thing called "comprehensive" covers your property when not driving...and if that doesn't cover all the medical/property bills, then involved parties are free to sue each other.
> $50 a month for liability
...so I presumed a resident of the US.
US car insurance policies vary from state to state, so I'll just say how I understand it in layman IANAL terms.
In my state, personal injury protection (PIP) and property damage liability (PDL or commonly just "liability") coverage are the minimum requirements to legally drive a vehicle. There's also bodily injury liability (BIL), but since my state is what's called a "no-fault state", it's not a hard requirement unless you're a taxi (although my coverage bakes it in; I understand this to be applicable towards passengers).
The parent also said:
> Pleasantly tolerable fee for a day where my car hits black ice and physics takes the wheel
In this case, liability coverage as I understand it won't cover damage to the insured's vehicle while driving, which falls under "collision" and is entirely optional for a vehicle that is outright owned (i.e. no lien on the title) in any US state, as far as I'm aware.
So PIP would cover your injuries, PDL would cover damages to the property of others, "collision" covers your property while driving, and this other thing called "comprehensive" covers your property when not driving...and if that doesn't cover all the medical/property bills, then involved parties are free to sue each other.
Why would I care about the damage done to my car if I'm knowingly paying for liability only on a sub $2000 car? When physics takes the wheel, I can't control who else I hit and how fast
I apparently didn't catch the part of your previous remark where you alluded to the value of your car, but to be fair, the car insurance industry isn't both heavily regulated and immensely profitable because most people truly understand what they're buying, as a mandatory legal requirement more often than not.
I don't understand. My car insurance is run by a mutual organization and they don't collect 10 times more money for no reasons. If you reduce the income of the insurance, who is paying ?
Maybe OP is suggesting there’s a lot of fraudulent claims in auto insurance, or poor driving/maintenance practices that lead to more claims.
When your insurance company has a lot of customers, you don’t care about your big claim’s contribution to rate increases because it will be pennies/month. (Yes, I understand your rates can go up if you’re at fault, but you can also stop driving, drive without insurance (in some places) or reduce your policy).
While this ship has thousands of containers, they probably run through a handful of shipping agents that won’t be in business for long if they make fraudulent claims.
When your insurance company has a lot of customers, you don’t care about your big claim’s contribution to rate increases because it will be pennies/month. (Yes, I understand your rates can go up if you’re at fault, but you can also stop driving, drive without insurance (in some places) or reduce your policy).
While this ship has thousands of containers, they probably run through a handful of shipping agents that won’t be in business for long if they make fraudulent claims.
I don't know how insurances work outside of Germany but processing insurance claims is the only thing where insurances can lose money so they will reward you for good driving/maintenance practices with lower fees. If you run a insurance company your goal is basically to become redundant. The best case scenario is to collect a monthly fee but never pay out any insurance claims. Fraudulent claims are pure losses so there is already a strong business incentive to avoid those.
The bigger the risk that needs to be insured, the bigger the market for the insurers, and profits scale with the size of the market.
Insurers are incentivised to minimise claims on their own policies, yes, but as a group they are perfectly happy with rules which increase the overall size and amount of claims, provided it affects everyone equally.
I guess your tow truck drivers are more respectable than ours that cloned police’s pricey “encrypted” radios to get to accidents faster, charged insurecos hundreds for the tow, would add damage to cars and bring them to sketchy repair shops:
https://nationalpost.com/news/toronto-cop-part-of-organized-...
For some reason, health care expenses related to motor vehicle accidents are paid by the at-fault’s insurer instead of the public health system, so there’s lots of fraud there too. And more product for insurers to sell.
Since the at-fault insurer pays, there’s a lot of incentive for fraud for the “victim”. Some call it the auto-lotto.
Because we created lots of arbitrary fault-determination rules so insurers can’t fight eachother to assign fault, it’s not difficult to stage an accident where someone else is at-fault.
https://nationalpost.com/news/toronto-cop-part-of-organized-...
For some reason, health care expenses related to motor vehicle accidents are paid by the at-fault’s insurer instead of the public health system, so there’s lots of fraud there too. And more product for insurers to sell.
Since the at-fault insurer pays, there’s a lot of incentive for fraud for the “victim”. Some call it the auto-lotto.
Because we created lots of arbitrary fault-determination rules so insurers can’t fight eachother to assign fault, it’s not difficult to stage an accident where someone else is at-fault.
> I guess your tow truck drivers are more respectable than ours that cloned police’s pricey “encrypted” radios to get to accidents faster, charged insurecos hundreds for the tow, would add damage to cars and bring them to sketchy repair shops:
In my country the insurance company has a list of approved garages and sets the price. Nobody is going to pay a tow truck for preemtively moving a car, they might arrest them for taking without consent.
If a car really needs a tow for safety purposes, the police will organise that based on their pre-existing contracts and paid for a known price (by the insurance company, or the car owner)
If the car is abandoned the council will eventually shift it and claim the cost back as littering
If the car is safe though it's upto the owner to contact their insurance company and arrange for them to come out and shift it.
Multiple companies racing to the scene sounds like something from the 1800s with fire brigades sabotaging each other.
In my country the insurance company has a list of approved garages and sets the price. Nobody is going to pay a tow truck for preemtively moving a car, they might arrest them for taking without consent.
If a car really needs a tow for safety purposes, the police will organise that based on their pre-existing contracts and paid for a known price (by the insurance company, or the car owner)
If the car is abandoned the council will eventually shift it and claim the cost back as littering
If the car is safe though it's upto the owner to contact their insurance company and arrange for them to come out and shift it.
Multiple companies racing to the scene sounds like something from the 1800s with fire brigades sabotaging each other.
> While this ship has thousands of containers, they probably run through a handful of shipping agents that won’t be in business for long if they make fraudulent claims.
I don't think they can even make fraudulent claims.
Whether a container gets thrown over board or not is a binary outcome.
How much value to declare upfront is self-policing:
If you declare a high value and someone else's containers gets thrown overboard, your share of the averaged losses is bigger.
I don't think they can even make fraudulent claims.
Whether a container gets thrown over board or not is a binary outcome.
How much value to declare upfront is self-policing:
If you declare a high value and someone else's containers gets thrown overboard, your share of the averaged losses is bigger.
There's significant counterparty risk in that model. What happens when there is an incident and people don't have the money to pay up?
You seize their cargo.
You seize the lost 1800 containers?
The people who lost containers get paid compensation. If they don't want it, the shipping company doesn't care.
The people who didn't lose containers are the ones who have to pay up their share of the losses. If they don't pay, you seize their cargo.
The people who didn't lose containers are the ones who have to pay up their share of the losses. If they don't pay, you seize their cargo.
What about insurance fraud? A container isn't going to jump off the ship so that it can collect from the others.
I'm part of an organization called CommonEasy that does this with sickness insurance. The group is a couple of hundred people that basically self-insure for up to two years of income loss. Ten bucks a month is for the organization, the rest is put in a savings fund. Should you leave, you take your savings with you.
> I'm part of an organization called CommonEasy that does this with sickness insurance. The group is a couple of hundred people that basically self-insure for up to two years of income loss. Ten bucks a month is for the organization, the rest is put in a savings fund. Should you leave, you take your savings with you.
Huh, that's an interesting combination. Should you need to make a claim, does it come out of your own savings first before the group coverage starts?
Huh, that's an interesting combination. Should you need to make a claim, does it come out of your own savings first before the group coverage starts?
But with cars it's different as the individuals are responsible for their action. Not some shipping company. Why should I pay for reckless/drunk drivers?
> But with cars it's different as the individuals are responsible for their action. Not some shipping company. Why should I pay for reckless/drunk drivers?
As with all real insurance plans, you are insured against the actions of others as much as you are against your own actions. This is obviously true in the 12 states + Puerto Rico with no-fault policies.
You may well be distracted at some point and crash into someone else, which is why both of you have insurance. It's crazy to think you can't possibly ever make a single mistake - ever. You can and you will, which is why you're legally required to carry insurance.
As with all real insurance plans, you are insured against the actions of others as much as you are against your own actions. This is obviously true in the 12 states + Puerto Rico with no-fault policies.
You may well be distracted at some point and crash into someone else, which is why both of you have insurance. It's crazy to think you can't possibly ever make a single mistake - ever. You can and you will, which is why you're legally required to carry insurance.
Car insurance plans often cover a lot more than just the driver’s own actions and mistakes. Common line items are insurance for personal injury and property damage caused by other uninsured drivers (because good luck getting your medical bills paid by garnishing the other person’s wages), and damage from weather, natural disasters, falling objects, animals, and vandalism.
When I ran my quotes, about 3/4 of the premium was for liability. The rest (fire; theft, fixing my car if it was my own fault, hail, etc) made up the balance.
My car is worth $4k tops, so I cancelled the rest. The odds of a total loss are low, so a $500 or $1k deductible combined with the likely scenario of a $2k-$3k repair bill made it very meh to bother paying another $400/yr for.
My car is worth $4k tops, so I cancelled the rest. The odds of a total loss are low, so a $500 or $1k deductible combined with the likely scenario of a $2k-$3k repair bill made it very meh to bother paying another $400/yr for.
> The odds of a total loss are low, so a $500 or $1k deductible combined with the likely scenario of a $2k-$3k repair bill made it very meh
It's even worse than that. If you have significant damage, there's a good chance they'll "total" your car. This means they'll write you a check for the appraised value (minus your deductible), and scrap the car. And it's awfully hard to find a worthwhile replacement for the book value of your old one, so even with insurance you're not avoiding the bill.
Another thing that irks me about insurance is that when you raise your coverage limits the premiums go up significantly. I can't imagine the long tail of extreme damages form a significant part of their actuarial tables, so it feels more like price discrimination based on your own assets that you don't want to lose. But really the entire point of insurance is to protect against the vanishingly small long tail - the idea of liability coverage limits should be done away with (if someone causes a million dollars in damage and can't pay, their insurance company shouldn't be able to walk away!), and the main cost-saving lever should be your deductible.
It's even worse than that. If you have significant damage, there's a good chance they'll "total" your car. This means they'll write you a check for the appraised value (minus your deductible), and scrap the car. And it's awfully hard to find a worthwhile replacement for the book value of your old one, so even with insurance you're not avoiding the bill.
Another thing that irks me about insurance is that when you raise your coverage limits the premiums go up significantly. I can't imagine the long tail of extreme damages form a significant part of their actuarial tables, so it feels more like price discrimination based on your own assets that you don't want to lose. But really the entire point of insurance is to protect against the vanishingly small long tail - the idea of liability coverage limits should be done away with (if someone causes a million dollars in damage and can't pay, their insurance company shouldn't be able to walk away!), and the main cost-saving lever should be your deductible.
Yeah, a “total loss” to me is a fire where the car is worth $100 to a scrapper. To insurance, if every fender and bumper gets dented, it’s a total loss, but I’m happy to continue driving it, and it still has $2k+ in parts.
A family member made money on a not-at-fault accident where they would pay $2700 to a repair place, but they took a cheque for $1900 and got it fixed for $950 (parts and labour).
A family member made money on a not-at-fault accident where they would pay $2700 to a repair place, but they took a cheque for $1900 and got it fixed for $950 (parts and labour).
You still need insurance for liability.
Depends on the jurisdiction and its enforcement.
And even where it is, most states have minimum requirements that haven’t been updated in decades.
https://drivinglaws.aaa.com/tag/liability-laws/
That person that runs you over may legally only have $25k in insurance to cover your death. Your estate will have to go after their non-estate of debts>assets to get any more.
But in mine, it’s much better to have have insurance than not, and the minimum coverage is $200k at least.
And even where it is, most states have minimum requirements that haven’t been updated in decades.
https://drivinglaws.aaa.com/tag/liability-laws/
That person that runs you over may legally only have $25k in insurance to cover your death. Your estate will have to go after their non-estate of debts>assets to get any more.
But in mine, it’s much better to have have insurance than not, and the minimum coverage is $200k at least.
You sign a contract with a shipping company, and you can choose not to sign it. Can you choose not to use a country's road system?
That's just self insurance, legal in most places with a few requirements. Most large car hire companies practice it.
For more info on the nautical origins of the word "average," check out this episode of The History of English Podcast:
https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/2020/04/06/bonus-episode...
https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/2020/04/06/bonus-episode...
Interesting! I assumed “General Average” came from the mathematical sense, but it turns out it was the other way round. Etymonline has a good summary: https://www.etymonline.com/word/average
Sounds like a horrible idea since the insurance pool is limited to the size of the ship. Hopefully at least it’s averaged by value rather than number of containers so that if someone is shipping corn and a container of iPhones gets jettisoned they don’t get a bill for their life savings.
Yes, the idea is that everyone loses the same percentage of what they had (including the ship owner—the value of the ship before and after the incident is also included in the calculation). General Average long predates modern containerized shipping, so doing it by container count wouldn’t have been a thing anyway.
A larger pool would require more frequent payouts to other vessels, or collecting regular premiums.
Aren't there supposed to be some sort of insurance for this type of a thing?
Wikipedia traces the origins of General Average to 800 BC, so it rather predates the modern insurance industry—it’s basically a group insurance policy where you only have to pay the premium if something happens. Nowadays if you’ve insured your container that will also cover GA for the shipment, but if you shipped uninsured you have to pay it yourself.
Actually a pretty cool idea. Otherwise you'd have people bribing the captain to make them throw out their stuff last, increasing fare prices for everyone, but in a hidden way.
Couldn’t this just...still be happening? Wouldn’t this general average concept only provide better cover for a secret bribing system?
Indeed you can still bribe the captain for throwing someone else's cargo out, but that wouldn't bring you any benefits, except of some hassle. In the event of cargo being thrown out, you will have to pay your part of the loss, regardless of if it was your crate that was thrown out or someone else's. If it was your crate, you will get its value replaced (minus your part of the lost value ofc). As there is no damage, why would you want to bribe them?
Declare your cargo as hardly worth anything, then actually send gold bars, and bribe the captain...
I mean if I have important or. valuable cargo, let’s say MacBook Pros, it seems efficient and beneficial to have some clothes thrown out first before my container.
Not if they spend so long moving aside your laptops to find the clothing that the entire ship sinks. With General Average they can sort out the problem ASAP and then do the math later to repay you so that you and the clothing manufacturer both only lose 10% of your cargo’s respective values.
If three people died trying to save your MacBook Pro, that'd be bad. Which is why the idea is based around not caring what's in a given container.
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That doesn't sound bad. If you ship a lot, you may save money on the insurance fees and only chip in in the event something actually gets lost. The insurance fees would obviously include the actual premiums (income) of the insurers, which you save the money on, so in the long term it should cost you less, shouldn't it?
That sounds weird, shouldn't the owner of the ship be responsible?
With this general average there is no incentive to the operator to operate safely. Spending time to properly securing containers, not overloading etc.
With this general average there is no incentive to the operator to operate safely. Spending time to properly securing containers, not overloading etc.
The rules only take effect if the loss was reasonably incurred. So declaring General Average opens up the operator to an investigation of the question, "was the cargo stowed according to industry standards".
See: https://comitemaritime.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/YAR-20...
See: https://comitemaritime.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/YAR-20...
Additionally, there are many methods by which shipped goods are insured/paid/credited under Admiralty Law [0]. This part of law is particularly 'old' and traditional, so it's fairly complicated, but a fascinating thing to look into.
To give a taste, with tramp shippers there are largely three classes of contracts, called charters [1]:
1) Demise charter hires a ship with no administration or technical maintenance included. The charterer gets possession and full control of the ship with legal and financial responsibility of it. The charterer pays for operating expenses, like fuel, crew, port expenses, and P&I and hull insurance. Demise chartering is common with tankers and bulk-carriers.
2) Voyage charters hire a ship and crew for a voyage between ports. The charterer pays the ship owner per-ton or lump-sum. The owner pays port costs (but not stevedoring), fuel costs, and crew costs. Payment for vessel use is called freight. A Voyage charter specifies laytime for loading and unloading cargo. If laytime is exceeded, the charterer pays demurrage. If laytime is saved, the charter party requires the shipowner to pay despatch.
3) Time charter is the hiring of a ship for a period of time; the owner still manages the ship but the charterer chooses ports and directs the ship where to go. The charterer pays for fuel, port charges, commissions, and a daily hire to the owner of the vessel.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiralty_law
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chartering_(shipping)
To give a taste, with tramp shippers there are largely three classes of contracts, called charters [1]:
1) Demise charter hires a ship with no administration or technical maintenance included. The charterer gets possession and full control of the ship with legal and financial responsibility of it. The charterer pays for operating expenses, like fuel, crew, port expenses, and P&I and hull insurance. Demise chartering is common with tankers and bulk-carriers.
2) Voyage charters hire a ship and crew for a voyage between ports. The charterer pays the ship owner per-ton or lump-sum. The owner pays port costs (but not stevedoring), fuel costs, and crew costs. Payment for vessel use is called freight. A Voyage charter specifies laytime for loading and unloading cargo. If laytime is exceeded, the charterer pays demurrage. If laytime is saved, the charter party requires the shipowner to pay despatch.
3) Time charter is the hiring of a ship for a period of time; the owner still manages the ship but the charterer chooses ports and directs the ship where to go. The charterer pays for fuel, port charges, commissions, and a daily hire to the owner of the vessel.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiralty_law
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chartering_(shipping)
Ah ok fair enough! Thanks for the explanation.
How does this work when one type of cargo is more valuable than others? If you lost a couple crates of bananas, and I lost a couple Ferraris, presumably you don't owe me a Ferrari now? :)
No, everyone else whose stuff survived owes me 90% of two crates of bananas and you 90% of a pair of Ferraris. (I should have edited in that it’s based on percent of value while I had a chance, this seems to have caused more confusion than I expected.)
I think the question should have been phrased “If your crate of bananas was recovered, and I lost a couple Ferraris, presumably you don't owe me a Ferrari now?”
It seems like the “fair” thing to do would be to pretend the entire cargo was lost, and the value of the remaining cargo is distributed in proportion to the value of each person’s cargo.
So if $500,000 of Ferraris were lost and $500 of bananas were recovered the Ferrari guy would get $499.50 and the banana guy would get $0.50.
It seems like the “fair” thing to do would be to pretend the entire cargo was lost, and the value of the remaining cargo is distributed in proportion to the value of each person’s cargo.
So if $500,000 of Ferraris were lost and $500 of bananas were recovered the Ferrari guy would get $499.50 and the banana guy would get $0.50.
Yeah, I’m not doing a great job of explaining it but that’s more or less how it works. I think the way it actually happens is that the banana guy pays $499.50 and gets his bananas back, but that’s effectively the same thing. Also there are administrative costs and the value of this ship is also involved in the calculation, but that’s a bit in the weeds.
Makes sense, thanks!
This reminds me of the way exodus parties across deserts used to use a simple risk-sharing mechanism against potential theft/pirates. Put simply, it was agreed upon that those on the extreme ends of a migrating party were more vulnerable to attacks from desert pirates. So, they would be compensated by the rest of the group (in the case of any such events) for shouldering the riskier positions in their migration.
> surprise bill
That policy sounds like something that would be common in shipping for a long time, and something that insurance companies would long have had covered against, no?
That policy sounds like something that would be common in shipping for a long time, and something that insurance companies would long have had covered against, no?
If you have insurance, yeah, they’ll take care of everything for you. But if you didn’t buy insurance for your container, imagine getting a letter that says “your container arrived safely, but you have to pay an extra $1,000 because some other peoples’ didn’t. Oh, also, that’s only an estimate that you have to pay a deposit on, it could take months to sort everything out and get an actual total.”
Reminds me of a Nassim Taleb talk I saw at a blockchain conference in 2018, where he talked extensively about Hammurabi's Law.
See:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Da0aXfshlxM and
- https://fs.blog/2017/11/hammurabis-code/.
See:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Da0aXfshlxM and
- https://fs.blog/2017/11/hammurabis-code/.
Random thoughts:
- I'm somewhat astonished that a ship of this size can hit a storm this size and limp back to port despite losing 1,800 containers.
- 1,800 containers floating around in the ocean is going to be a major shipping hazard until they sink, which may take a while if the goods packed within are buoyant (eg. anything packed in styrofoam).
- A friend used to work in the transshipping biz, and she said this kind of thing is why you buy insurance: odds are 99.99%+ your container will come through entirely unscathed, but if you hit the negative jackpot, everything will be completely gone. In 2013, the sinking of the MOL Comfort also meant the loss of 4,300 containers. https://gcaptain.com/mol-comfort-incident-photos/
- I'm somewhat astonished that a ship of this size can hit a storm this size and limp back to port despite losing 1,800 containers.
- 1,800 containers floating around in the ocean is going to be a major shipping hazard until they sink, which may take a while if the goods packed within are buoyant (eg. anything packed in styrofoam).
- A friend used to work in the transshipping biz, and she said this kind of thing is why you buy insurance: odds are 99.99%+ your container will come through entirely unscathed, but if you hit the negative jackpot, everything will be completely gone. In 2013, the sinking of the MOL Comfort also meant the loss of 4,300 containers. https://gcaptain.com/mol-comfort-incident-photos/
I just shipped about £25,000 of personal effects - they wanted to charge me 5% for insurance!
I’m really glad seeing the estimates for container loss in this thread that I decided to just wear the risk myself.
I’m really glad seeing the estimates for container loss in this thread that I decided to just wear the risk myself.
I remember something similar - I moved from Scotland to Finland and we used a shipping container to move some of our stuff.
Of course we sold/donated most things, and didn't try to transport furniture. We shipped 80cbft / 2.26 cubic meters of stuff. The price for removal was £570.00, and the price of insurance was £307.40.
So in our case insurance was damn near 50% of the shipping price.
(Quick edit: Found the actual emails so those numbers are correct.)
Of course we sold/donated most things, and didn't try to transport furniture. We shipped 80cbft / 2.26 cubic meters of stuff. The price for removal was £570.00, and the price of insurance was £307.40.
So in our case insurance was damn near 50% of the shipping price.
(Quick edit: Found the actual emails so those numbers are correct.)
What would you estimate the value of the contents to be?
My memory would be £10,000-£15,000.
Mostly it was sentimental stuff, I know we shipped cutlery, paintings, a very small number of books, clothing etc. But roughly speaking we'd got rid of anything and everything we could easily replace.
(And it has to be said that the pair of us carried a few suitcases for our flights, we'd filled those with plants and other fragile items.)
Mostly it was sentimental stuff, I know we shipped cutlery, paintings, a very small number of books, clothing etc. But roughly speaking we'd got rid of anything and everything we could easily replace.
(And it has to be said that the pair of us carried a few suitcases for our flights, we'd filled those with plants and other fragile items.)
So the insurance is more like 2-3%...
Plants? Over an international border? :)
I was in a long-distance relationship with a Finnish woman for a few years. After a while she'd start packing/bringing a couple of small plants with her each time she visited.
Nothing too exotic, just things like spider-plants and some indoor vines. She'd lightly-wrap them with newspaper and then stick them in the middle of her suitcase surrounded by clothes.
So pretty much all the plants we took from Scotland to Finland were ones she'd already moved in the opposite direction a year or two earlier!
I know some countries have restrictions on plants/animals and similar things, but it never seemed to be a concern for her travels.
Nothing too exotic, just things like spider-plants and some indoor vines. She'd lightly-wrap them with newspaper and then stick them in the middle of her suitcase surrounded by clothes.
So pretty much all the plants we took from Scotland to Finland were ones she'd already moved in the opposite direction a year or two earlier!
I know some countries have restrictions on plants/animals and similar things, but it never seemed to be a concern for her travels.
Heh Heh Heh
Don't do that if you visit Australia. They'll (for real) throw you in jail if you bring in plants or animals without a permit. ;)
https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/goods/plant-products/h...
Don't do that if you visit Australia. They'll (for real) throw you in jail if you bring in plants or animals without a permit. ;)
https://www.agriculture.gov.au/import/goods/plant-products/h...
This is heavily restricted to avoid importing invasive plants. It's often some innocent behaving plants that end up completely taking over in the wild.
EU, so it's easier.
Internal EU border probably at the time, so it should be fine.
> So in our case insurance was damn near 50% of the shipping price.
How does that make any sense? The probability of loss is nowhere near 50%.
How does that make any sense? The probability of loss is nowhere near 50%.
50% of shipping fees isn’t 50% of insured value.
d'oh.
I only pretend to know how to read.
I only pretend to know how to read.
Shipping price is not the price of the goods needing to be replaced. So if the goods were worth £25k then £300 is just over 1% which would seem more reasonable.
[deleted]
I don’t know what the actual odds are and certainly can’t judge for you whether insurance is good for you, but your risk isn’t only container loss at sea. The container may be stolen, they may drop your container from a height of a meter, the ship may lists repeatedly for 40 degrees, your container may get flooded with seawater for a few hours, it may get misrouted and lost for half a year, etc.
Sure. There are lots of risks. But does the insurance policy actually cover those risks? Scaring people into buying insurance is a fun time, but it feels like half the time the things they scare you with aren't even covered.
If they're scaring you with something they'll cover it. I sold insurance for a tiny amount of time, they teach you all the loopholes and it's the loopholes is where they get you. An example and this is just an theoritcal example, if the container was routed around the world for 6 months then declared lost then it could be possible that the insurance would only cover being lost for 3 months after which the insurance expires.
Insurance is usually quite negotiable. In particular, instead of going for the "insure all the things" option the movers will heavily push on you, you can opt to nominate only select items and give them realistic valuations yourself.
But is the insurance only for nautical loss or is it more an insurance policy about portside mistakes and "mistakes" that also happens to occasionally handle loss at sea?
5% is nuts. They don't lose 5% of goods.
When my parents moved from the UK to Nee Zealand all the valuable stuff went missing. This was some time ago but it seemed theft was endemic.
A buddy worked for a company that shipped many thousands of containers around the world each month. He said right around 10% of the containers are never seen again. Lost, stolen, overboard, whatever.
That being said I've shipped my vehicles are few times and always just taken the risk. Most recently (in early 2019) I shipped from Egypt to Canada was quoted 1.5% of the value for insurance.
That being said I've shipped my vehicles are few times and always just taken the risk. Most recently (in early 2019) I shipped from Egypt to Canada was quoted 1.5% of the value for insurance.
10%!? That seems excessive. Were these containers packed with diamonds or something?
PS. Love http://theroadchoseme.com :)
PS. Love http://theroadchoseme.com :)
He and I were shipping our vehicles together, and when we declined the insurance he told that story.
awww, thanks ! :D
awww, thanks ! :D
Your buddy lied to you. 10% is 100% made up.
The house always wins. What did you expect? Insurance is for when a loss would be unacceptably big.
And I guess there are more things that can go wrong than dumping cargo. Breaking in transit.
And I guess there are more things that can go wrong than dumping cargo. Breaking in transit.
Anyone insuring containers in sea transport probably can't wake up for less than a 1000 pound premium.
> 5% is nuts. They don't lose 5% of goods.
I don't know how you think insurance works as a business if you didn't already know that they charge more than the money they have to pay out?
I don't know how you think insurance works as a business if you didn't already know that they charge more than the money they have to pay out?
Most insurance charges more than double what they pay out on average. That's why I self insure whenever it's legal to do so.
Sure, loss ratios are about 40-60% for many types of insurance.
But there's benefits from risk pooling. A small annual fee to not have to deal with most of the economic cost if my house burns down or if I get cancer is worth it in how it reduces volatility.
Once you have a high net worth, paying for small amounts of insurance becomes more questionable, because variability matters much less and because of the negative expected value of the transaction.
This model misses some of the corner cases. Title insurance and boiler insurance have loss ratios of almost nothing, for instance, but are extremely economically useful. (The real service they're providing is inspection and research to make sure that the risk is negligible before insuring the risk). Auto insurance has a negative EV, but when my carrier subrogated when someone rear-ended me it was useful and convenient. Insuring a package so that you don't need to investigate shipping calamities from your customers can be useful.
But there's benefits from risk pooling. A small annual fee to not have to deal with most of the economic cost if my house burns down or if I get cancer is worth it in how it reduces volatility.
Once you have a high net worth, paying for small amounts of insurance becomes more questionable, because variability matters much less and because of the negative expected value of the transaction.
This model misses some of the corner cases. Title insurance and boiler insurance have loss ratios of almost nothing, for instance, but are extremely economically useful. (The real service they're providing is inspection and research to make sure that the risk is negligible before insuring the risk). Auto insurance has a negative EV, but when my carrier subrogated when someone rear-ended me it was useful and convenient. Insuring a package so that you don't need to investigate shipping calamities from your customers can be useful.
[deleted]
They have to charge more than the average or they couldn’t be in business.
But given the “General Average” concept you could have received a bill for many times the value of what you shipped.
No, General Average is based on percentage of value, so the most you could have to pay is however much the stuff you were shipping was worth, if basically all the other cargo on board was lost except yours.
Yes, if that mythical container full of iPhones full of bitcoins got tossed first everybody else would be screwed. If that was common the next step might be clients with particularly cheap wares bribing the captain to sacrifice their containers first.
Which is great in theory, as everyone’s incentives align.
Absolutely! It's a highly theoretical scenario, but it would be that one time when refusing bribery would almost be borderline unethical (but if course deliberately sacrificing the value crate before others unless paid would be definitely unethical, and deeply so).
I wonder if insurance companies bribe captains on occasions to throw overboard couple of uninsured containers to "make an example" out of people who think they don't need insurance and to "spread the word".
Unlikely, if only because it's actually not easy to do that. You'd have to get the container placed at the edge of the ship when in dock, then get the locks on the container undone while underway, then either hope that the container gets washed overboard in a storm, and doesn't hit the ship on its way out, or get a couple guys to lever it off.
Which is totally doable, except that a container can weigh 30 tons, and you've got the space between rows of containers to use for working in. Admittedly, if it's at the top of the column, its probably a lighter container. But it's still going to be heavy, with the crew working up in the air, in a relatively narrow area.
Which is totally doable, except that a container can weigh 30 tons, and you've got the space between rows of containers to use for working in. Admittedly, if it's at the top of the column, its probably a lighter container. But it's still going to be heavy, with the crew working up in the air, in a relatively narrow area.
> https://gcaptain.com/mol-comfort-incident-photos/
"The bow section was towed most of the way towards the Arabian Gulf, but eventually burst into flames and sank"
So much awesome.
"The bow section was towed most of the way towards the Arabian Gulf, but eventually burst into flames and sank"
So much awesome.
So... the front fell off?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-QNAwUdHUQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-QNAwUdHUQ
After seeing the film All is Lost with Robert Redford solo sailing around the world I have a deep visceral fear of partially submerged shipping containers. You could be sailing thousands of miles from shore and suddenly sinking.
Make sure your EPIRB batteries are fresh (and the device is tested) and your life raft is ready to be deployed, and you’ll be fine.
There was a story a few days ago about someone who was somehow spotted clinging to his overturned boat by a containership crew about 90nm offshore. His EPIRB did not deploy for some reason. He tried swimming down to detach it, but couldn't get that deep.
Yeah, I agree with you, but Chaos finds a way :-(
Yeah, I agree with you, but Chaos finds a way :-(
Tell that to the dead crew member of TS5 Hallucine catamaran that went overboard during the collision with a UFO at night.
Preparedness doesn't translate into zero risk. You could die driving to pickup a coffee from your local coffee shop. You’re still going to go get that coffee.
https://i.imgur.com/4uBqPmz.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/4uBqPmz.jpg
Most containers sink.
Citation needed.
Not to whom you are responding to, but I spent years at sea and can confirm that they do in fact sink - some wash up on shore. Take it for what you will.
Edit: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/med-taipei-shipping-container...
Edit: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/med-taipei-shipping-container...
A friend of mine is doing a mostly self-funded startup (chalkboardmap.com) and has cargo on this ship.
It really sucks.
It's their first shipment after doing a Kickstarter. They have 1,000 maps on the ship and they're not sure if the maps are in the water or not.
When I heard the story, I couldn't even believe it happened.
Like, who thinks... "well I hope my container doesn't fall into the ocean"?
What are the odds?
But now, seeing this article, I realize the case really is extraordinary.
It really sucks.
It's their first shipment after doing a Kickstarter. They have 1,000 maps on the ship and they're not sure if the maps are in the water or not.
When I heard the story, I couldn't even believe it happened.
Like, who thinks... "well I hope my container doesn't fall into the ocean"?
What are the odds?
But now, seeing this article, I realize the case really is extraordinary.
We are still in shock. Our chalk board maps were so close to being in our customers hands after many covid set backs. Then we get word that our ship was in a storm. I’m just glad that the crew is ok. How scary.
This is probably what caused the whole incident. If anything can go wrong with a kickstarter, it will!
Any insurance relief?
Any insurance relief?
That is so true. I’m his friend and I had already faced so many setbacks with this Kickstarter. It was supposed to ship in July. Literally the day I was announcing to my backers that it should arrive in the US soon and opened up our mobile app for photo magnet orders the ship was in the storm.
My sourcing partner / logistics team reports that our insurance will cover damage or loss. But it’s going to take several weeks just to sort through it all.
Here’s a picture of the ship: https://share.icloud.com/photos/0gLIQVJUHGxk2lkSGFrJ8-AYg
My sourcing partner / logistics team reports that our insurance will cover damage or loss. But it’s going to take several weeks just to sort through it all.
Here’s a picture of the ship: https://share.icloud.com/photos/0gLIQVJUHGxk2lkSGFrJ8-AYg
That picture is nuts. Strange that the container stacks seem to have fallen in both directions, almost alternating. Why would they do that?
Not a mariner, but I'll guess for fun. I'd expect rows to fall at different times due to differences in weight or whatever. The ship was likely rolling between port and starboard. So I'd expect a roughly even split of which direction the container rows fall.
Maybe they even fell strictly in sequence due to how they were secured to each other.
There might even be a video of this happening, but probably not a real high-quality one in the weather conditions that caused this...
Maybe they even fell strictly in sequence due to how they were secured to each other.
There might even be a video of this happening, but probably not a real high-quality one in the weather conditions that caused this...
Rocking from left to right until the stacks topple. Randomized chance of going left or right.
[deleted]
Something that surprised me is that companies are under no obligation to disclose loss of cargo unless it contains dangerous or hazardous goods. [1] I'm sure the fact that they estimate 64 to be Dangerous Goods, and the general magnitude of the number of containers lost has led to this website being setup. Apparently ~1/100,000 containers are lost at sea, which is higher than I might have guessed.
Also, I found the short podcast series Containers [2] to be an interesting introduction to shipments by sea.
[1] https://www.eurosender.com/blog/en/lost-sea-shipping-contain...
[2] https://www.stitcher.com/show/containers
Also, I found the short podcast series Containers [2] to be an interesting introduction to shipments by sea.
[1] https://www.eurosender.com/blog/en/lost-sea-shipping-contain...
[2] https://www.stitcher.com/show/containers
Container ships (and standardized containers) are a major reason for the standard of living in our modern society. The volumes are so huge, that the cost per package to ship halfway around the world is relatively small.
The downside is, accidents can be of startling proportions.
The downside is, accidents can be of startling proportions.
I watched a YouTube video about the economics of scrapping still useable cruise and container ships recently (spoiler: the price of scrap steel is worth more than the cost of continuing to run old ships). One of the mind blowing points was that its cheaper to send a container from the UK to Australia, than from the UK to Switzerland.
Interesting as well that the actual voyage is pretty cheap, compared with the local transits and the various port and filing fees at each end.
I'd love to see this?
Im pretty sure its this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qo-2gDg-37w
Yes that's it, thanks.
It has more to do with standardized handling and not breaking bulk than with volume. Vessel size has grown, but only slowly. If you look at how shipping was done back when longshoremen broke bulk it was a stupendous amount of work.
I was in school as a merchant marine officer. I remember my Cargo Operations instructor telling us that "back in the day" when they went into Singapore or other port in that region on a break-bulk ship, they would expect to be in port for 2-3 weeks, and go out and see the sights (read: hookers and bars). "But with containers, these days we're lucky if we are in port for more than 12 hours before we're unloaded and back out to sea."
It's one reason why manufacturing of anything from furniture to electronics is hardly done in the west anymore; because shipping is relatively cheap compared to the wage difference, it's much cheaper to have things built in china and shipped here.
I do believe that long-term, probably in our lifetime, this balance will shift; China's economy (and with it, wages and cost of living) is and has been booming for decades, and the US's wages (slash minimum wage) have been static for just as long. I suspect this is why China is investing a lot in infrastructure internationally; I think we'll see Africa become a big player in manufacturing, sponsored and financed by China.
To me it seems to be an er, interesting kind of economic / capitalist colonialism, something not done by force but by incentives (loans to pay for it, people to build it, forfeiture of the infrastructure if the loan cannot be paid back).
I do believe that long-term, probably in our lifetime, this balance will shift; China's economy (and with it, wages and cost of living) is and has been booming for decades, and the US's wages (slash minimum wage) have been static for just as long. I suspect this is why China is investing a lot in infrastructure internationally; I think we'll see Africa become a big player in manufacturing, sponsored and financed by China.
To me it seems to be an er, interesting kind of economic / capitalist colonialism, something not done by force but by incentives (loans to pay for it, people to build it, forfeiture of the infrastructure if the loan cannot be paid back).
I think you're right on about Africa, except that it might also include parts of South America. For at least the last century, different countries have climbed the industrial production ladder; "made in Japan" and "made in Taiwan" were for a time associated with "cheap crap" manufacturing, then higher-quality stuff as their economies and industries finished (re)building and maturing, then finally the bulk of it got offshored and those labels are now pretty rare to see in the US. Mainland China's on the same ladder. Certainly in our lifetime we'll see some other countries start getting tapped for the "cheap crap" manufacturing as China tries to divest itself of that (it'll hang on to the electronics for a lot longer, of course), and then eventually on up their own ladders.
While it's not often that an iPhone is called "Made in Taiwan" or the latest Gaming Console as "Made in Japan," Taiwan and Japan are still very much present in the US.
I completely agree though that the label "Made in Japan" isn't present. In fact, if I remember correctly, "Made in $Country" labels are an import requirement that may in fact be a form of protectionism? I'm sure the argument could be made either way.
I completely agree though that the label "Made in Japan" isn't present. In fact, if I remember correctly, "Made in $Country" labels are an import requirement that may in fact be a form of protectionism? I'm sure the argument could be made either way.
The downside is also: sweatshops and greenhouse gas emissions.
The page states that the winds were at BF 4 (13-18 MPH) and waves were 5-6 meters (16-20 feet) during the incident.
One Apus measures out at 364 meters.
I spent four years at sea and 5-6 meters with BF4 winds, isn't THAT bad- especially for a ship that size. Am I missing something here?
One Apus measures out at 364 meters.
I spent four years at sea and 5-6 meters with BF4 winds, isn't THAT bad- especially for a ship that size. Am I missing something here?
Am I missing something here?
Look at the picture they posted of their ship. You see any lashings holding the top 3 layers of containers? And the ends aren't aligned, so they can't be held together with twistlocks. Is anything holding those upper containers in place?
This is the second ONE ship to lose containers this year.[1]
[1] https://www.seatrade-maritime.com/casualty/second-one-boxshi...
Look at the picture they posted of their ship. You see any lashings holding the top 3 layers of containers? And the ends aren't aligned, so they can't be held together with twistlocks. Is anything holding those upper containers in place?
This is the second ONE ship to lose containers this year.[1]
[1] https://www.seatrade-maritime.com/casualty/second-one-boxshi...
It would be quite unusual to get 5-6 meter waves at BF4. That's more of a BF8 level. I bet it's misreported. Most ships, even small ones, will not care for BF4.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaufort_scale#Modern_scale
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaufort_scale#Modern_scale
Couldn’t the waves originate elsewhere where it’s BF8? What’s going to stop a wave in the open ocean?
Waves can travel, but big waves quickly spend their energy, because, unlike swells, they break. When the wind goes down, waves quiet down very quickly.
Other waves. The ocean is pretty disorderly
That's a good question. It says the prevailing winds were BF4, but then earlier it mentions 'gale force' which implies BF8? Something seems missing indeed.
Surely a weather forecast could have predicted the wind force and then this could have been avoided? Or has something failed or the loading been done incorrectly?
Sometimes captains decide to go through much worse storms.
That's what happened with El Faro, if I remember correctly. A huge ship sunk by a huge storm. The captain was a self-sure moron, killed 30+ people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_El_Faro
That's what happened with El Faro, if I remember correctly. A huge ship sunk by a huge storm. The captain was a self-sure moron, killed 30+ people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_El_Faro
No, there's absolutely no way 4 bft winds would cause a ship, especially one such as that, to lose containers normally. 4 bft winds are a small fraction of the waves such a ship should normally be able to endure: this ship's usual duty is sailing massive distances in the Pacific, where such winds are completely normal. If this actually occurred in 4 bft winds, there has to have been either a massive screwup somewhere or a series of mechanical failures.
I've been out sailing in BF4 a few times in a 8m/~24f boat, #2 jib and spry main sail hand and its completely manageable - OK not with that reported swell. There must be another explanation.
I’ve been on worse with my 43 foot sailboat.
My smartass reaction was "I wonder if that's where my PS5 is."
But this got me thinking: it would be very interesting to get a listing of everything lost. Even as just a one-off case study. What does it look like to lose a container ship worth or cargo?
But this got me thinking: it would be very interesting to get a listing of everything lost. Even as just a one-off case study. What does it look like to lose a container ship worth or cargo?
My Kickstarter that I’ve been working on for a year now and that backers have been waiting on for months was on that ship. Needless to say, it’s been a brutal week.
Chances are it still is on that ship.
As someone else already figured out, the chance that the container is still on the ship is around 75% (assuming that the lost containers were all 40ft, that would be 3600 TEU out of the ship's capacity of 14000 TEU) - however, even if it is still on the ship, there will probably be delays while they carefully unload the damaged containers. Not to forget that the ship will probably head to the next port, not to its actual destination...
Yes, but that's better than even chances that their load will be preserved. This is part and parcel of the risk of ordering stuff from far away.
Absolutely sucks and sorry to hear. Are you related to ijidak's post (chalkboardmap.com) or another kickstarter?
You could then determine an over/under on recovering them. Ideally you could recover them all, but you would need some that weren't just rice and beans to make it worthwhile.
They're not sealed though, I think?
Now I'm wondering about how much stuff survives and how that correlates with value.
Now I'm wondering about how much stuff survives and how that correlates with value.
https://www.airseacontainers.com/blog/are-shipping-container...
It would appear that containers in good condition are indeed water "resistant", that is, if rained on or spray with sea water, it won't get in the container.
Dropped in the ocean? Yeah, water is getting in.
It would appear that containers in good condition are indeed water "resistant", that is, if rained on or spray with sea water, it won't get in the container.
Dropped in the ocean? Yeah, water is getting in.
They’re water tight to prevent cargo exposure to the ocean and elements, but will sink once the remaining air escapes. They can float beneath the ocean surface for days to weeks, depending on contents and weight.
Do an image search for 'Shipping container floor'. They have horizontal steel bracing which a wooden floor gets mounted on. Definitely far from water tight.
The only way they are going to float for any period of time is if teh contents are watertight and low density
The only way they are going to float for any period of time is if teh contents are watertight and low density
“Wind and Water Tight” (WWT) is a specific condition/description of shipping container. I would agree they’re not air tight.
https://www.carucontainers.com/en-br/faq/what-does-wind-and-...
https://www.carucontainers.com/en-br/faq/what-does-wind-and-...
They could be accidentally air tight.
https://twitter.com/Dankmemsandmeme/status/13127772041877053...
https://twitter.com/Dankmemsandmeme/status/13127772041877053...
That's got to be fake, though, right?
Seemed like it. I finally looked it up, and yeah, there's a concrete barrier. https://www.reddit.com/r/memes/comments/k6kzmt/comment/gelr4...
I think also if they are refrigerated and full of food, the food rots and gases off, keeping them afloat longer. Also, I recall something about certain containers (or maybe it was just an experiment?) having holes in them plugged with a material which dissolves after extended exposure to saltwater - so within a few hours they sink.
I was thinking the same thing and wondering if that was several wafers worth of batches in Videocards / CPUs that we're all hitting F5 trying to order frequently.
How big of a problem is 1800+ containers lost in what I assume is a major shipping route?
The first thing that came to mind is the movie All Is Lost (2013)[1].
[1]: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2017038/
The first thing that came to mind is the movie All Is Lost (2013)[1].
[1]: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2017038/
Yes, this was the first thing that came to my mind as well. An excellent movie, especially as Robert Redford is the only actor in the entire movie, and I don't think he speaks more than a few words for the entirety of the film.
It's a horrible movie, from a sailor's perspective. I cringed/facepalmed all throughout it - he doesn't do a single thing an actual sailor would do (at least in a timely manner). The only way this movie would be acceptable was if the character was actually teleported onto the boat in the beginning of the movie with no prior sailing experience. So much stupidity.
One of my "favorite" moments was when he tied the liferaft to the sinking boat and went to sleep in the liferaft. And there were similar facepalm moments from beginning to end. I was so disappointed to see him rescued at the end of the movie. Drowning would've been a fitting, well-deserved ending - he was trying so hard.
One of my "favorite" moments was when he tied the liferaft to the sinking boat and went to sleep in the liferaft. And there were similar facepalm moments from beginning to end. I was so disappointed to see him rescued at the end of the movie. Drowning would've been a fitting, well-deserved ending - he was trying so hard.
I volunteer on a nautical SAR unit, and although it's been a few years, nothing in the movie struck me as out-of-character for a sailor. Casualty vessels rarely follow SOLAS/SAR guidance to the letter, and recreational sailors do all sorts of odd things when in trouble.
Also, I think we have different interpretations of the ending. Redford didn't survive.
Also, I think we have different interpretations of the ending. Redford didn't survive.
Please understand- I was talking about the acting, not the accuracy. Yes, when he ties his life raft to a sinking vessel... wat?
As for whether he died at the end or not, it's ambiguous- he's pulled from the water by someone in a boat, and that's it. We don't know if he expires from hypothermia, if he lives, or what- we just know that at the end of a hopeless journey there was hope.
And that's why I said it's an excellent movie.
As for whether he died at the end or not, it's ambiguous- he's pulled from the water by someone in a boat, and that's it. We don't know if he expires from hypothermia, if he lives, or what- we just know that at the end of a hopeless journey there was hope.
And that's why I said it's an excellent movie.
My interpretation of the ending was that Redford drowned, and the hand reaching to him was a metaphor for the end of suffering/spiritual salvation.
Horrible movie (see my other comment[0]) but I'm wondering this as well, and what measures are being taken to ensure safety for mariners. Ideally you'd either ensure that the containers sink (easy/cheap), or that they stay afloat with an AIS transponder (difficult/expensive).
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25331098
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25331098
> How big of a problem is 1800+ containers lost in what I assume is a major shipping route?
It could be a big problem for someone. IIRC, when some people move overseas long term, they sometimes ship their personal possessions via container, which now might be at the bottom of the ocean.
It could be a big problem for someone. IIRC, when some people move overseas long term, they sometimes ship their personal possessions via container, which now might be at the bottom of the ocean.
I know there was at least a couple of Kickstarter board games for Asmadi Games on there. They said this in the updates for the Good Puppers Kickstarter:
"...The ship, weather-battered (severe storm/gale-force winds is the actual cause of the above mess) and generally displeased with 2020's Bad Plan, is turning around to hit the closest major port (Japan) to assess damage. With 15-25% of its goods changed to bads, we might be lucky or we might not be, but we won't know for a couple weeks at best. In the meantime, our factory is going to try and rush out a fresh print run of the game shipped to us as soon as possible. I shall, of course, share more details as I know them!"
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/asmadigames/all-the-goo...
"...The ship, weather-battered (severe storm/gale-force winds is the actual cause of the above mess) and generally displeased with 2020's Bad Plan, is turning around to hit the closest major port (Japan) to assess damage. With 15-25% of its goods changed to bads, we might be lucky or we might not be, but we won't know for a couple weeks at best. In the meantime, our factory is going to try and rush out a fresh print run of the game shipped to us as soon as possible. I shall, of course, share more details as I know them!"
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/asmadigames/all-the-goo...
The sailing catamaran TS5 Hallucine hit a "UFO" (unidentified floating object) and sunk in November this year. One crewmember died. https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/f158/ts5-hallucine-caps...
During this year's Vendée Globe non-stop single-handed around the world sailing regatta, three boats (of 33) had collisions with UFOs and had to abandon the race in the first 4 weeks.
During this year's Vendée Globe non-stop single-handed around the world sailing regatta, three boats (of 33) had collisions with UFOs and had to abandon the race in the first 4 weeks.
Gitana 17 who attempted the Jules Verne trophy is also said to have collided with an UFO https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_Verne_Trophy#Failed_reco...
https://tropheejulesverne.sodebo.com/#cartographie Sodebo ultim is still on it so far.
https://tropheejulesverne.sodebo.com/#cartographie Sodebo ultim is still on it so far.
Slocombe had marauding islanders in canoes, these days we have containers. I have noticed more and more new boats are built with crash boxes at the front now. Does not really help if the container is floating a bit lower and rips your keel off. I think container detecting sonar is going to be very popular once the tech is perfected.
Interesting that they'd voluntarily raise this in their own published FAQ. Seems unusual for a PR site: "Are there any problems with the hull structure of this vessel type? We know the same type of vessel also experienced container loss recently."
The FAQ appears to be translated directly from the Japanese, which does not share the American tradition of admitting to nothing to avoid feeding lawsuits.
To be clear, the Japanese answers don't admit to anything either, the questions are just more blunt than you might expect.
To be clear, the Japanese answers don't admit to anything either, the questions are just more blunt than you might expect.
My experience of Japan and East Asian govt/megacorps is that they are far more honest on the surface level but will stonewall and put up far more resistance if you try to dig deeper/follow up.
Wow - that's a remarkably large number of containers. If my math is right, just about 25% of a full load on this ship.
Half-submerged containers can be pretty insidious navigation hazards. Hopefully nobody ends up hitting them before they sink.
Half-submerged containers can be pretty insidious navigation hazards. Hopefully nobody ends up hitting them before they sink.
gCaptain says the ship's capacity is 14,000 TEU. Assuming those are all 40 ft containers (2 TEU each), that's 7000 containers, so 24%.
https://gcaptain.com/containership-one-apus-loses-significan...
https://gcaptain.com/containership-one-apus-loses-significan...
I was surprised to find that between 2,000 to 10,000 containers are lost each year. Seems like with the design on these you’re just asking for trouble.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship
That doesn't seem awful compared to the number of containers.
> 1. There are currently over 17 million shipping containers in circulation globally with the number of active shipping containers at more then five million. In total, they make around 200 million trips a year, according to Billie Box.
https://www.porttechnology.org/news/10_unknown_facts_about_s...
> 1. There are currently over 17 million shipping containers in circulation globally with the number of active shipping containers at more then five million. In total, they make around 200 million trips a year, according to Billie Box.
https://www.porttechnology.org/news/10_unknown_facts_about_s...
Interestingly, that figure seems to be disputed.
From an article pointed at by another commenter:
https://www.yachtingworld.com/news/could-a-floating-shipping...
From an article pointed at by another commenter:
https://www.yachtingworld.com/news/could-a-floating-shipping...
Yet finding reliable data on how many containers actually
fall overboard is a challenge. The widely quoted figure of
10,000 containers lost every year [1] was the basis for
reports by organisations ranging from Friends of the Earth
to the US Congress.
But the World Shipping Council (WSC), a trade body that
represents 90 per cent of the global shipping industry,
disputes that number [2].
Based on surveys of its members the WSC reported that for
the years 2011, 2012, and 2013 there were around 2,683
containers lost each year [3]. Combining that data with
surveys going back to 2008, the WSC reports that excluding
‘catastrophic events’ the number of containers lost every
year is a mere 546.
A more recent survey for the six years 2008 through 2013
estimates average losses of individual containers
overboard at 546 per year, and average total losses
including catastrophic events such as vessel sinkings or
groundings at 1,679 per year [.]Is it surprising?
There are 800 million containers shipped per year. 10k is is a literal drop in the bucket.
It's 99.99875% relability.
There are 800 million containers shipped per year. 10k is is a literal drop in the bucket.
It's 99.99875% relability.
While true, it is quite staggering to visualize 100mx100mx75m of shipping containers to represent what gets lost every year. Yes it is tiny in the global scale of what is being shipped but wow that is a large apartment building every year getting dumped into the ocean.
> that is a large apartment building every year getting dumped into the ocean.
To be fair, we should probably visualize the total amount shipped per year. Which, if all the shipping containers were laid out in a single stack, could completely cover the US state of New Jersey or the country of Belize.
To be fair, we should probably visualize the total amount shipped per year. Which, if all the shipping containers were laid out in a single stack, could completely cover the US state of New Jersey or the country of Belize.
As I stated, "Yes it is tiny in the global scale of what is being shipped". Yes, the reuse of containers is impressively highly efficient but more and more industries are at the scale or significant pollution/externalities comes from small proportional failures. This isn't like dropping 0.0001% of requests on global web servers, dropping the same rate of containers from global shipping means apartment size building being dumped in the ocean every year.
Yes, energy is wasted on servers at large scale but this can be/is being mitigated as energy sources move faster and faster to renewable energy. Mitigation is much harder in physical world and should be costed in to resolve/clean up so there is a market to make environment better rather than just treating as an externality to increase margins.
Yes, energy is wasted on servers at large scale but this can be/is being mitigated as energy sources move faster and faster to renewable energy. Mitigation is much harder in physical world and should be costed in to resolve/clean up so there is a market to make environment better rather than just treating as an externality to increase margins.
I wonder if there's some way to compare that to driving accident/flying accident rates for a comparison. Though I'm not sure how to compare it as drivers drive more than once in a year compared to a container only shipped once.
The way to compare that would be to calculate the accident rate per freight ton-kilometer; it's the same consideration as with figuring how "green" some transport is by looking at CO2 per ton-kilometer.
cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Units_of_transportation_measur...
cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Units_of_transportation_measur...
I think it is actually designed as such on purpose: in the event of adverse weather, loosing some openly stacked containers is less severe than sinking an otherwise concealing but unstable ship. I imagine this is a sort of calculated loss, a trade-off of allowing a heavy ship to adjust – or "self heal", if you will – to extreme conditions dynamically, which should also be very rare and unlikely.
No, nothing like that.
It's just to make loading practical.
Also, a taller ship with a large mostly empty area up high might have some issues when lightly loaded with crosswinds - but probably more importantly it's just that you would need internal supports which again, will make loading much more complicated.
It's just to make loading practical.
Also, a taller ship with a large mostly empty area up high might have some issues when lightly loaded with crosswinds - but probably more importantly it's just that you would need internal supports which again, will make loading much more complicated.
I'm just trying to imagine what being in this ship must have been line when this thing collapsed. It must have been insane for quite some time. The initial collapse, then likely for some time after the sound and tremors as the unstable mass of containers continued to settle and slide off the deck. What a crazy life.
Can the hazardous containers ever be recovered? Should we be taking extra care when transporting hazardous cargo? Like positioning in a different part of boat or limiting overall cargo amount that can be transported when moving hazardous chemicals that can damage ecosystems and food sources?
"Dangerous goods" is an extremely broad category that covers both environmental concerns and handling/storage concerns. A shipment full of batteries or deodorant/paint spray cans is not really dangerous if it gets thrown into the sea, but firefighters need to know that in case a fire breaks out.
And you don't want to place something like pyrotechnics next to tires next to ammonium fertilizer as it was in that warehouse in Beirut.
tl;dr: "dangerous goods" classification is most important for on-shore handling and safety considerations, not because of environment concerns in case of an at-sea loss.
And you don't want to place something like pyrotechnics next to tires next to ammonium fertilizer as it was in that warehouse in Beirut.
tl;dr: "dangerous goods" classification is most important for on-shore handling and safety considerations, not because of environment concerns in case of an at-sea loss.
How anyone could downvote such an important comment is beyond me. Of course this should be a priority issue!
The 'anthropocene' is a steady process of attrition - environment protection should be at the top of planning and management in every industry.
The 'anthropocene' is a steady process of attrition - environment protection should be at the top of planning and management in every industry.
> 64 are believed to be Dangerous Goods containers
I'm curious what these actually contain?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dangerous_goods
I'm curious what these actually contain?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dangerous_goods
Often products with batteries in them. But also products with chemicals or generally products that cause could health, safety or fire concerns if not handled properly.
The fact that a single category "dangerous" is so broad is a serious problem.
No it's not. "Dangerous goods" in shipping terms is a specific term for a very broad category with multiple subcategories of goods covered by (in this context) the international maritime code on dangerous goods which enumerates in mind numbing detail what goods are covered and what arent. Anybody in the business, who this site is for, will know what "dangerous goods" refers to. Just because you don't know the meaning of a term doesn't mean it's not very precisely defined.
You don’t just declare your goods as “dangerous,” there’s a bunch of subcategories and you have to explain why your things are dangerous and what to do about it. This report is just summarizing.
>I'm curious what these actually contain?
>[We] can now confirm the contents of the estimated 64 Dangerous Goods containers ... 54 of the DG containers carry fireworks whilst a further eight hold batteries, and two contain liquid ethanol.The (added?) report says,
> 54 of the DG containers carry fireworks whilst a further eight hold batteries, and two contain liquid ethanol.
> 54 of the DG containers carry fireworks whilst a further eight hold batteries, and two contain liquid ethanol.
My question is, with Modern Technology, Satellite imagery and Weather forecast, how far are we from completely removing the risk of containers ship hitting a storm and lost containers?
While someone has pointed out It's 99.99875% reliability in a yearly basis. 10K Containers lost per year is still a staggering amount. Or more like 6 - 10 incidents like this per year.
We cant make ship travel any faster due to law of physics. Surely we could make it travel safer?
While someone has pointed out It's 99.99875% reliability in a yearly basis. 10K Containers lost per year is still a staggering amount. Or more like 6 - 10 incidents like this per year.
We cant make ship travel any faster due to law of physics. Surely we could make it travel safer?
Because efficiency is the name of the game. If you miss your slot time in a busy port you might spend some days or a week waiting on the next and now you have cascading logistics issues, both for the ship in question and the cargo getting sorted and sent forward.
The real issue is stowage, sailing for example north Atlantic in the winter you need to expect bad weather but there seems to be a missmatch between the regular lashings and large stacks right up to the stack limit by weight wee see today.
There's also designs like this [0] but that's more expensive to build and they lose 1-2 rows of containers.
[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/G4-class_freighter
The real issue is stowage, sailing for example north Atlantic in the winter you need to expect bad weather but there seems to be a missmatch between the regular lashings and large stacks right up to the stack limit by weight wee see today.
There's also designs like this [0] but that's more expensive to build and they lose 1-2 rows of containers.
[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/G4-class_freighter
It is impossible to completely remove the risk of running into heavy weather. Container ships are relatively slow and weather isn't always predictable.
The bigger problems are that ship crews don't properly lash down deck cargo. And some shippers falsely declare container weights, which makes it harder to do proper balance calculations.
The bigger problems are that ship crews don't properly lash down deck cargo. And some shippers falsely declare container weights, which makes it harder to do proper balance calculations.
> And some shippers falsely declare container weights, which makes it harder to do proper balance calculations.
Can't that be safeguarded against by adding a bit more smart tech to dock loading cranes?
These cranes already have information on which container goes from where on the dock to where on the ship, and they also should have some sort of weight sensor or other feedback to prevent overloading the crane / its motor. So it should be possible to add a cross-check "container weighs x.yz tons, should weigh a.bc tons" and emit an alert in case of a too gross mismatch.
This could also be used to prevent or at least detect smuggling of drugs and people as well as theft.
Can't that be safeguarded against by adding a bit more smart tech to dock loading cranes?
These cranes already have information on which container goes from where on the dock to where on the ship, and they also should have some sort of weight sensor or other feedback to prevent overloading the crane / its motor. So it should be possible to add a cross-check "container weighs x.yz tons, should weigh a.bc tons" and emit an alert in case of a too gross mismatch.
This could also be used to prevent or at least detect smuggling of drugs and people as well as theft.
I wonder why they are calling this a record number of containers lost. Did some quick googling and that doesn't seem to be true at all. The current record holder is the [MOL Comfort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOL_Comfort#Shipwreck) which lost its full compliment of 4.3k containers.
Maybe a record for a cargo less without shipwreck?
So I had a bunch of books shipped from Japan to Europe by surface mail, so quite possibly in a container on a ship like this. The package is still in transit so news like this makes me a bit weary.
Luckily the ship in question had sailed from China to the USA, so it most likely does not have my package. Still, best of luck to others with package in transfer by seamail! :)
Luckily the ship in question had sailed from China to the USA, so it most likely does not have my package. Still, best of luck to others with package in transfer by seamail! :)
The U.S. used to allow very cheap international book shipping by surface mail, called an M-bag
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/What-is-M-bag-Service
It was kind of insanely cheap compared to other ways of transporting books internationally. But it was discontinued about a decade ago and replaced with airmail M-bags, which may still be cheaper than many other options but are not nearly as cheap as the surface M-bags were.
Did you (or someone who was sending you these books) find a service like this still available from Japan? I'd be happy to hear that this is still offered in other countries and that people are still getting a benefit from it.
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/What-is-M-bag-Service
It was kind of insanely cheap compared to other ways of transporting books internationally. But it was discontinued about a decade ago and replaced with airmail M-bags, which may still be cheaper than many other options but are not nearly as cheap as the surface M-bags were.
Did you (or someone who was sending you these books) find a service like this still available from Japan? I'd be happy to hear that this is still offered in other countries and that people are still getting a benefit from it.
I havent seen any book specific options, but it could be that the transshipping companies I used (Tenso, Buyee) so far simply dont have those.
In general there is quite a good price for air shipping < 2 kg. But above that weight air shipping costs get really expensive. On the other hand surface ahipping is already cheap at 2 kg and get even cheaper per unit of mass as your package gets heavier, up to 30 kg max (or some fairly genwrous size limits).
So thats why I used surface mail for those books - they were mostly second hand and shipping them by air would be quite a bit more expensive than theor price in many cases! :)
In general there is quite a good price for air shipping < 2 kg. But above that weight air shipping costs get really expensive. On the other hand surface ahipping is already cheap at 2 kg and get even cheaper per unit of mass as your package gets heavier, up to 30 kg max (or some fairly genwrous size limits).
So thats why I used surface mail for those books - they were mostly second hand and shipping them by air would be quite a bit more expensive than theor price in many cases! :)
I used it once in the past. I cried when the bag arrived. The books were ground to a fine pulp, with all covers torn off and only some of the insides remaining holding together. The bag contained mostly dust.
No amount of throwing would do this: they bag must have been thrown insecured into a larger container, where it slid around and bumped into other things as waves rocked the ship(s).
Never, ever again.
No amount of throwing would do this: they bag must have been thrown insecured into a larger container, where it slid around and bumped into other things as waves rocked the ship(s).
Never, ever again.
My father owns a bookstore and would use surface M-bags, while they existed, to ship things to customers overseas (with their permission). I believe he never had a problem with significant damage to the contents.
I agree it's got to be riskier for books than the airmail options, and I'm very sorry to hear of what happened to your books when you used it. :-(
I agree it's got to be riskier for books than the airmail options, and I'm very sorry to hear of what happened to your books when you used it. :-(
Do containers have long life GPS trackers so we can track them in situations like this?
Containers aren't really a uniform thing aside from their size and stacking. Whoever commissioned/owns the container could decide to put a tracker in, but to my knowledge (which is from "hobby curiosity") it's extremely rare.
Also, the GPS trackers would stop working very quickly if the containers sink. Regular bulk shipping containers aren't waterproof so I'd expect the majority of the lost containers to be at the bottom of the ocean by now - at that point the trackers would neither receive GPS nor be able to send anything really. (cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_with_submarines )
Also, the GPS trackers would stop working very quickly if the containers sink. Regular bulk shipping containers aren't waterproof so I'd expect the majority of the lost containers to be at the bottom of the ocean by now - at that point the trackers would neither receive GPS nor be able to send anything really. (cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_with_submarines )
GPS trackers are sometimes used, but GPS is receive-only, they allow you to track the location history if you have gotten the container and the tracker; but it does not imply having the ability to locate it if it's lost because the container can't send its location to you from the middle of the ocean - doing that would require essentially having a satellite radio with proper antennas, and that's not generally done. A naval transponder would allow it to be located if you're within perhaps 40 miles or something in the ballpark, but events like this tend to happen much further from a coast.
In any case, that would be worthless, in almost all cases it wouldn't be worth to explicitly go out and retrieve the container even if it would still be undamaged and floating (which is unlikely).
In any case, that would be worthless, in almost all cases it wouldn't be worth to explicitly go out and retrieve the container even if it would still be undamaged and floating (which is unlikely).
If they did, the containers at the bottom of the stack would be blocked from getting a GPS signal.
Last time I looked into this, which was over a decade, some of the containers at the top could have GPS and ZigBee, and would relay their position to the other container using ZigBee.
I also remember that the company I worked for, I was told that we paid a premium to have our containers placed lower on the stack, in the event something like in the article occurred.
Last time I looked into this, which was over a decade, some of the containers at the top could have GPS and ZigBee, and would relay their position to the other container using ZigBee.
I also remember that the company I worked for, I was told that we paid a premium to have our containers placed lower on the stack, in the event something like in the article occurred.
Wouldn't they just sink ? Most of the things shipped wouldn't survive a trip in salty water I assume, and even if they do I'd I doubt we'd spend any money on a rescue mission
Most would sink yes. Ideally all containers would be ensured to sink, except for those containing materials hazardous to the marine environment, in which case they should contain floats (activated upon being thrown into the sea) and an AIS transponder.
I suppose we can be glad that at least the front didn't fall off.
What's more scary is the half-submerged invisible containers floating around, waiting to hit some unsuspecting sailboat in the middle of the night.
_All Is Lost_, the 2013 movie about exactly this, is actually a really great film.
Except for the first five minutes, there is only a single word of dialogue in the script: "FUUUUUUUUCK!"
Except for the first five minutes, there is only a single word of dialogue in the script: "FUUUUUUUUCK!"
Good article about dangers (or not) of shipping containers to yachting and some of the solutions:
https://www.yachtingworld.com/news/could-a-floating-shipping...
https://www.yachtingworld.com/news/could-a-floating-shipping...
I just saw last night that one of the plastic modeling/hobby shop owners I follow on YouTube had a container on board: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAR7UZ_6L3o
As a note these ships can carry up to 14,000[1] (!) 20ft containers.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird-class_container_ship
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird-class_container_ship
I guess that's how we get to see videos like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ983bvP5YU
How many containers were on board in total? Cannot seem to find that in article or in comments here on HN?
After reading this title I was more suspected to think the whole boat sunk.
After reading this title I was more suspected to think the whole boat sunk.
it seems you'd want your container near the bottom of the stack and closest to the bridge (near the midline of the ship). They should charge different amounts for container placement. If your container is at the top corners near the bow of the ship you should have to pay the least amount for insurance/shipping since you're taking the most risk.
I'm assuming weight factors heavily into loading arrangement, and they probably mostly want to avoid other factors complicating how they stack containers aboard.
Loading a container ship is massive puzzle. The weight is one thing, but other one is that the operation really isn't point to point, but series. So starting from China empty(probably not) the ship is filled and then it visits multiple ports. And neither the ship or the ports want to waste time to move containers out and back in so containers going to later ports have to be below containers going to earlier ports. And containers travelling to the later ports can also be added on the way.
in any case, the ones that i thought would have been lost are still somehow there : https://old.reddit.com/r/CatastrophicFailure/comments/k90wdj...
never using docker again...
shoulda used docker-swarm or k8s for fault tolerance