First of two article on Marine Safety in Splash 24/7:
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The first thing that the authors of this report could do is to establish if it is possible for the crew of a ship to comply completely with required standards. According to the guidance book issued by one P & I club in their 350 pages of instructions the master checks everything. Even delegating tasks doesn’t work. When a 24,000 TEU vessel sails someone has put their John Hancock on a piece of paper that the containers are all secured in accordance with the lashing plan. Really!
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My guess is that a large percentage of the items that are supposed to be done cannot be done as envisioned by the regulation writers or done at all in light of reduced crewing and the regulatory limit to hours of work. To your example of the 24000 TEU vessel how could any one person, or several, even be aware of what is in them from the manifest let alone check each of them for markings and stowage and securing. Maybe on a 90 day voyage that MIGHT get done. Time for some realism to be injected into the shipping industry. However, it is easy for the people ashore to cast the blame as IT IS THE MASTER’S RESPONSIBILITY TO ENSURE while the take away any of his means to actually do so.
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Survival suite for everyday use: