July 2019
“SHOW THE FLAG”
“Let us respect, honor and revere our Philippine Flag!” was President Fidel V Ramos’ concluding line in his Maritime Review article three years ago after he graced a few weeks earlier the 118th Anniversary of the Battle of Alapan that took place on 28-May-1898 in Imus, Cavite. After this victorious battle of Filipino revolutionary forces against Spanish troops, General Emilio…
Engaging with China
The 2018 National Security Strategy of the United States revealed a change in posture, tacitly stated by Christopher Preble in his article “The Benefits of Engaging with China Far Outweigh the Costs and Risks” (30-January-2019) in The National Interest: The assumption that engagement with rivals and their inclusion in international institutions and global commerce would turn them into benign actors…
Coast Guard Presents Newly Acquired Rescue Assets
As part of the Philippine Coast Guard’s (PCG) capability development program, newly acquired rescue boats, vehicles and other equipment were presented yesterday, 30-May-2019, to beef up the agency’s readiness for the expected threats of typhoons that may hit the country this year. During the blessing and launching ceremony at the PCG Headquarters yesterday, the PCG Commandant Admiral Elson E Hermogino,…
The Three P’s of Vessel Performance Optimization
Columbia Ship-management has a vision for fully connected vessels with near real-time information exchange, strengthened processes, decision-making, and value creation for customers through end-to-end voyage optimization. Pankaj Sharma, Columbia Control Room manager of Columbia Ship-management believes that three aspects are critical to achieving this vision – implementing a scalable platform, ensuring the right people are working for you, and facilitating…
What is Seaspeak?
Seaspeak is the official language of navigators the world over. As the official language of the seas, Seaspeak helps to prevent any form of miscommunication. And since miscommunication can easily lead to serious and dangerous situations, seafarers use a specific language to prevent nay accidents from happening. Have you ever wondered how crews on ships at sea communicate? Nowadays, crews…
The Missing Maritime Zone
Not all the maritime zones of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOSC) are automatically ascribed to a State. The LOSC provides, among others, the different maritime zones as we know them. Among these are the Territorial Sea, Contiguous Zone, Continental Shelf and the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). It is important to note – a…
Maritime Navigation: A Lost art?
Navigation by definition is the process or activity of accurately ascertaining one’s position and planning, and following a route. Also, navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft from one place to another. The past few years have recorded many global maritime incidents, collisions, groundings, and sinkings. The…
Strangling Global Shipping
Recent events in the West Philippine Sea as well as other incidents involving shipping lanes, ferry crossings/sinkings, oil discharges into open water, and attacks on vessels, should have brought the attention of the global maritime industry. In monitoring the news, I see it has not. This spiked my curiosity as to why and what would happen if global sea lanes…
Australia Funds World’s First Offshore Blue Economy Platform
The University of Tasmania will lead the largest ever Cooperative Research Centre (CRC), bringing together expertise in seafood, renewable energy, and offshore engineering to transform Australia’s blue economy. The Blue Economy CRC aims to drive an evolution in marine-based industries, unlocking enormous economic, environmental and technological benefits. The $329 million research project is a 10-year collaboration between 45 national and…
New App to Help Save Millions Lost on Rejected Demurrage Claims
A new app developed by a specialist demurrage analyst hopes to save the oil and tanker industry millions by simplifying the demurrage claims process. Digital Ship spoke with the creator of the app, Ms Leena Asher to find out more. In the oil and tanker industry, millions of dollars are being lost due to the rejection of demurrage claims as…
Electronic Information Exchange Now Mandatory for Ports
A mandatory requirement for national governments to introduce electronic information exchange between ships and ports came into effect on 8-April-2019. The aim is to make cross-border trade simpler and the logistics chain more efficient, for the more than 10 billion tons of goods which are traded by sea annually across the globe. The requirement, mandatory under IMO’s Convention on Facilitation…
Life Cycle GHG Emission Study on the use of LNG as Marine Fuel
The Society for Gas as a Marine Fuel (SGMF) is pleased to announce the results of the Well-to-Wake (WtW) Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions Lifecycle Research Study on the use of LNG as a marine fuel. Independent consultants of Thinkstep specializing in life cycle analysis conducted the study. SGMF and SEA\LNG commissioned the study. Dr Oliver Schuller, Team Lead Energy &…
We4Sea Secures Funding to Roll Out Unique Fuel Monitoring Platform
Dutch maritime start-up We4Sea secured funding from ENERGIIQ, Mainport Innovation Fund II and angel investors to accelerate development and roll out of its fuel and emissions monitoring platform. Based in Delft, Netherlands, We4Sea has an ambitious goal of saving 1 million tons of CO2 emissions from ships. Speaking with Digital Ship, CEO and cofounder of We4Sea‘s Dan Veen explained that…
ENI to Build Industrial-Scale Offshore Wave Power Plants
The Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of Cassa depositi e prestiti (CDP) Fabrizio Palermo; Giuseppe Bono of Fincantieri; Luigi Ferraris of Terna, and Claudio Descalzi of Eni, signed a non-binding agreement today at the Eni HQ in the EUR district of Rome to develop and build Wave Power Stations on an industrial scale. Eni now operates in 67 countries. The agreement…
Shell Marine Launches Shell Alexia 40 Lubricant Ahead of IMO 2020
In support of customer preparedness for IMO 2020, Shell Marine is introducing Shell Alexia 40 – a new two-stroke engine cylinder oil specifically for use with engines running on 0.5% sulphur content Very Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (VLSFO). With a Base Number (BN) of 40, Shell Alexia 40 has been developed to optimize equipment performance and condition as ship owners…
MacGregor Builds First Fiber Rope Offshore Crane
MacGregor, part of Cargotec, has completed the construction of the first fiber-rope offshore crane on the market. The company says that its new FibreTrac crane is able to exploit its full lifting capacity because fiber rope weighs virtually nothing in water, so no additional load is experienced by the crane, regardless of the length of rope used during load handling…
Ørsted and WindServe Order more Workboats for U.S. Wind Farms
Offshore wind farm company Ørsted and U.S.-based offshore wind support operator, WindServe Marine, are partnering to build two new crew transfer vessels (CTV s) for the budding Jones Act wind market. CTV’s are the workboats that carry workers to and from offshore wind towers for construction, maintenance and operations, and the new builds will be the second and third of…
Russia Launches Poseidon-Capable Belgorod Submarine
Russia’s Sevmash Shipyard launched the special-purpose submarine Belgorod (KS-139) at Severodvinsk in a restricted ceremony held on 23-April-2019. The Kremlin hid most of Belgorod from public view during the launch. Belgorod started construction in July 1992 and was initially to be part of the Project 949AM submarines, also known as the Oscar II-class guided missile submarine. In 2012, the decision…
Submarine Communications and Sensor Systems
INTRODUCTION This article is an attempt by the author to relate the basic concept of submarine design parameter with respect to operation and understanding how the submarine operates at the surface of the sea, below the surface of the sea, and at the bottom of the surface of the sea, in an upright position. A submarine operation consists of horizontal…
The Port Management Office of Zamboanga Del Norte (PMO-ZDN)
The City of Dipolog is the capital of Zamboanga del Norte, which is the largest province of the Zamboanga Peninsula region by land area, covering 7,301 sq. km. located in northwestern Mindanao. The City of Dapitan is the place where the Spaniards exiled Jose Rizal, our national hero, for his revolutionary ways, making Dapitan a shrine-city. Since 1993, the Port…
The Trade Winds El Niño and La Niña
The Earth has five major wind zones: (1) polar easterlies, (2) westerlies, (3) horse latitudes, (4) trade winds, and (5) doldrums. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA): “Early commerce to the Americas relied on the trade winds —the prevailing easterly winds that circle the Earth near the equator. Known to sailors around the world, the trade winds…
Bulusan Lake
Bulusan Lake surrounds the foothills of Mount Bulusan Volcano, located in the municipality of Bulusan, Sorsogon province, Bicol Region. Mount Bulusan, which has erupted at least 15 times since 1885, is considered the 4th most active volcano in the Philippines after Mayon, Taal, and Kanlaon Volcanos; and is the highest peak in Sorsogon. On 23-October-2016, Rappler reported that a phreatic…
Friend of the Sea Certifies South Korean Silla Skipjack and Yellowfin
Purse Seiner vessels of a South Korean company, Silla Co. Ltd, is found compliant with Friend of the Sea’s sustainability criteria, following third party certification audit. Six Silla purse seiner vessels catching mainly Skipjack and Yellowfin Tuna in the Western Central Pacific have been approved according to international certification sustainability requirements. The certified Tuna does not come from overfished stock….