Articles

ITS March 2021 Maritime Law Volume 2 “A ship due to exit a narrow channel may be under an obligation to give way” Regular columnist Simon Tatham tackles the legal conclusions from the English Supreme Court ruling for when vessels are crossing at the entrance to narrow channels Let us assume your tug is leaving…

Regular columnist Simon Tatham casts a legal eye over what is to be expected within the 2021 updates of BIMCO’s TOWCON and TOWHIRE standard contracts Contractual workhorses of the towage world, TOWCON and TOWHIRE 2008 have just been updated with the 2021 editions and are to be published by BIMCO very shortly, after final review by their drafting committee. The finalised forms are eagerly awaited. That is not…

In February 1977 a vessel in ballast, Unique Mariner, ran aground in Indonesian waters not far from Singapore.  The master was advised by ship’s agents that a tug would be sourced. A professional salvor’s tug turned up from Singapore and the master mistakenly thinking that it was the tug procured by the agents, signed Lloyd’s…

I am into week six of lockdown. The new office is closed and all partners and staff working, more or less happily, from home. The roses are out, the potatoes are in, the lettuce are pushing on but there is absolutely no sign of the parsley (sown late because more efficient people ordered up the…

In this article we discuss the main practicalities of invoking clause 20 of the BARGEHIRE 2008 contract which is a force majeure clause. This might be because a shutdown in the field of operation means that it cannot be manned or loaded, that the cargo destined to be carried is very seriously delayed or simply…

At the time of writing, Northern Europe has been hit by large storms, posing danger to shipping. Imagine then, that your tug is on return passage to Scandinavia from the US when it picks up a Pan-Pan signal. Deviating towards the ship in distress, its master advises by VHF that they have been drifting for…

On 11 March 2020 the World Health Organisation designated the Covid 19 virus as a pandemic. We have since received a number of enquiries…

Lloyd’s has declared, like a good port, the new Lloyd’s Open Form 2020. It’s the 13th iteration of what is arguably the longest standing and most successful of marine services contracts.  Is this a vintage edition? For sure, much work has been devoted by colleagues in the Salvage Working Group, in London, to bring the…

The crew had abandoned ship and the stricken vessel drifted at the mercy of the Arabian Sea’s monsoon weather. The main engine had failed. The ship’s condition, and the risk of her foundering were unknown. The 10,500 tonnes of the vessel’s bulk cargo in four holds was not likely to move, unless flooding occurred. Her…

Having recently ourselves settled a case involving a tug that had fallen out of class shortly before the incident in question, it was interesting to see that such a case has recently found its way from an arbitration award to the Court of Appeal in London. It is seldom the case (and was not in…