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Misdeclared container cargoes
Each year around two million containers packed with dangerous goods are loaded onto ships and carried without special precautions. This is because they have been wrongly declared as non-dangerous − either fraudulently or by mistake
As a result, the containers can − and frequently do − catch fire, explode or leak, putting seafarers’ lives at risk and potentially causing great damage to adjacent containers, the ship itself and its operator’s reputation.
Our analysis of past misdeclared dangerous cargo incidents shows that the container booking process remains the weak link in the system. We therefore published a special edition of our Standard Safety entitled Better Box Booking in 2018, which sets out measures that ship operators can put in place to review and tighten their container booking procedures.
Following publication of the guide, our loss prevention team has lectured extensively on the topic around the world.
