The correct packing, stowing and securing of freight containers and the accurate declaration of their weight is not only an art form, but also a technical challenge in itself. These processes are critical to the safety of container ships, their crew, cargo, harbour workers and the environment. Even if the cargo has been properly stowed in the container, the weight has been taken into account during stacking and everything has been expertly secured, there are numerous potentially critical factors to consider. These include storms and rough seas, human error, stack collapse and rare but devastating events such as collisions or running aground on reefs.

However, this was only a fraction of the loss compared to 2013, when the largest container loss to date was recorded as part of a shipping accident. At that time, a storm broke out in the Arabian Sea. Dents formed on the hull of the ship „MOL Comfort“, which was also more than 300 metres long, and then a kink appeared. Finally, the ship broke into two parts, which drifted away from each other at around two knots and after some time were 35 kilometres apart. The rear half of the ship sank after ten days, while the front half followed almost two weeks later.

As soon as containers enter the water, most of them quickly sink to the bottom of the sea. However, depending on their cargo, some can float on the surface for days or weeks before sinking. Refrigerated containers can remain on the surface even longer due to their buoyant insulation. One notable example is a container that washed up on the south coast of the UK only eleven months after it disappeared off the coast of France in the Atlantic.

A Swiss marine biologist estimates that at least 12,000 standard containers are floating in the world’s oceans. This figure is worrying, as these hard-to-recognise UFOs („Unidentified Floating Objects“) pose a significant risk of accidents for smaller vessels such as yachts and fishing boats. In fact, the risk of collision is high, as the containers drifting just below the surface are only visible with difficulty and late in normal waves. Even the ship’s radar is of little help in this respect, as it only detects large objects above the surface of the water. There are frequent reports of collisions and damaged yachts that have to be rescued. In particularly serious cases, some of these boats even sink.

In addition to the dangerous hazardous goods containers, there are also concerns about the thousands of tonnes of plastic that end up in the sea in this way. In addition to plastic products and packaging, large quantities are transported in the form of small pellets known as „nurdles“. They serve as the basic material for most plastic products and are only a few millimetres in size. If these small pieces end up in the sea, they float on the surface of the water and sooner or later drift ashore. There, at the latest, they are seen as food and eaten by birds and small animals. It is therefore important to clean the beaches of the pellets. The cleaning of the beaches is financed by the ship insurers, but the real problem is the discovery of the small pieces – as the pellets are not considered dangerous cargo, the loss of a container carrying them does not have to be reported separately.

Considering that containers can often float on the world’s oceans for weeks at a time, seawater-resistant labelling is crucial, especially for the transport of hazardous goods. This marking makes it possible to identify the type of cargo even after a long time in the water, to take appropriate measures and to help minimise the risk of accidents and protect the environment.

With seawater-certified labelling from Boxlab Services, shipping companies and freight forwarders can ensure that dangerous goods are identified and handled appropriately even after the container may have gone overboard. This is an important step in ensuring both the safety of shipping and the protection of the environment.