The 11th international conference for maritime logistics (mariLOG) took place on May 4th, 2021 – as part of the online event of transport logistic 2021. Transport logistic is regarded as the leading trade fair for logistics, mobility, IT and supply management. In 2019, 2374 exhibitors and around 64,000 visitors from 125 countries gathered at the on-site event. This year, the fair is held as a purely digital event.

The mariLOG conference took place as a panel discussion between high-ranking market participants on the following topic: How can we fix what Corona has done to the relationship between carriers and their customers.

The corona pandemic is putting a strain on the relationship between carriers and their customers. The latter have complained that shipowners have used their market power inappropriately to drive up freight rates. In addition, there is a lack in contractual loyalty and service quality. The shipowners, in turn, point to the collapse in demand in the wake of the pandemic and to capacity increases on the main trade routes. What needs to be done to improve the relationship between the parties?

In 2021, we started to put the spotlight on our passionate ship spotters. Each month, we introduce another ship spotter of FleetMon.com. In Mai, you’ll meet ship spotter Max (User name: dragonflyer11), a nautical student from Germany.

What is your maritime background?

I am 21 years old. I come from Frankfurt/Main – Germany. I have always been interested in vehicles but later ships caught all of my attention. I‘ve been onboard several inland vessels and ferries which helped me establish more and more contacts over the time. Then I worked for a year as a skipper on small sailing cutters for tourist group trips on Lake Constance in Southern Germany. At the moment, I study navigation and maritime transport in Elsfleth which is between Bremen and Bremerhaven in Northern Germany. In 2020, I went to sea for half a year on a coaster where I found many great spotting motives! My aim is to become a captain once.

Let me tell you a story from an upcoming John McTiernan movie: A ship is sailing peacefully 200 nautical miles off the Nigerian coastline, literally being in the middle of nowhere. Out of the blue, pirates manage to strike the ship and end up boarding it eventually. The crew, in their natural response, gather in a safe room, fearing their safety.

However, the pirates set aloof in their efforts in entering the ship’s bridge. It takes them six hours to bypass the Citadel, but they do it eventually. The pirates manage to kidnap 15 crew members and unfortunately, kill one member in skirmishes. How will they be saved? And most importantly, who will save them?

Think this is a plot good enough to be a sequel to Paul Greengrass’s Captain Phillips? Well, think again.

Evidently, I lied to you before when I told you it was going to be the next John McTiernan classic. It isn’t. This happened in real life on board the containership MOZART, which, unlike its namesake musician, wasn’t very lucky. FleetMon reported about the piracy attack in Jan 2021.

So, welcome to the Gulf of Guinea, where militant activities, armed robberies, crew killings, and tanker boardings are as common as the morning light. Before delving deeper into the possible remedies to these acute problems and the factors behind them, let’s break the situation down to you so you have a coherent understanding of the same.

Oh, how we miss those giant cruise liners arriving at and departing from the cruise terminal of Rostock Warnemünde. Did you know that Rostock’s economy is dominated by shipbuilding, tourism and navigation? 119 cruise liners visited the port of Rostock in 2019. In contrast to 2020, when only 11 cruise liners entered the cruise terminal of Rostock Warnemünde.  The pandemic has been hitting the cruise industry hard and prevented most cruise liners to travel the Seven Seas. 

Welcome to the second edition of the FleetMon Maritime Gallery. Each month, you’ll find a special section on our blog featuring the Best Maritime Photos in a certain category. You’ll not only get to view the most popular photos being voted by our community for “Photo of the Week” and “Photo of the Month”. We also present special shots which are less popular but in the same way extraordinary.

In April, we present a selection of the best cruise liner photos in our monthly Maritime Gallery. All cruise fans will love that. Have fun and enjoy great vessel photography!

Each month, we announce an update on how we extended our terrestrial AIS coverage worldwide. Become an AIS Partner and contribute to Global Maritime Transparency. Please have a look at our latest achievements on the AIS receiving station network.

FleetMon supports ETH researchers to find the answer.

Fighting climate change demands action in all sectors. International shipping faces the challenge of long lifetimes of vessels compared to other modes of transportation. Decisions on energy carriers and propulsion technologies that are made now have a long-lasting impact on the emissions of the sector. 

A research group at the Institute of Energy Technology at ETH Zürich led by Prof. Dr. Konstantinos Boulouchos developed a fleet turnover model for the shipping sector to estimate its future CO2 emissions up to 2050. Thereby, the CO2 emissions of existing ships and those of new ships entering the fleet yield yearly emission figures. However, up until recently, a missing puzzle piece for such models has been how long existing ships will actually still be in service. Missing or prohibitively expensive data has prevented analyses on this topic.

National Coast Watch Center: A Look at the country’s Maritime Inter-Agency Set-Up

Maritime domain awareness (MDA) is defined by the International Maritime Organization as the effective understanding of anything associated with the maritime domain that could impact the security, safety, economy, or environment. The maritime domain is defined as all areas and things of, on, under, relating to, adjacent to, or bordering on a sea, ocean, or other navigable waterway, including all maritime-related activities, infrastructure, people, cargo, and vessels and other conveyances.

We received the following article by Ely Loyd A. Villarosa, currently the Senior Intelligence Analyst of the Philippines’ National Coast Watch Center: The article is about the Philippines’ National Coast Watch Center, the only government agency that caters inter-agency mechanisms for maritime security operations.  The NCWC was funded by the US government through the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.

In 2011, then-President Benigno S. Aquino III signed Executive Order No. 57 creating the National Coast Watch System as the central inter-agency mechanism for a coordinated and coherent approach on maritime issues and maritime security operations towards enhancing governance in the Philippines’ maritime domain.  One of its organs is the National Coast Watch Center, the implementing and operating arm of the System. 

First came the pandemic in 2020, something that roiled shipping and disrupted the supply chains in and out of China, which soon spread out to the rest of the world like wildfire. And then came one of the biggest hurdles the logistics industry has faced in years, the closure of the Suez Canal, dubbed by some as a ‘crisis’ and rightly so.

An estimated 12% of the world’s trade passes through the Suez Canal daily, representing almost $10 billion in trade on a good day as per Llyod’s List. Serving as the link between rising Asian powerhouses and relatively wealthier Europe, it is undoubtedly the most important waterway in the world.

There’s no doubting the magnitude of the problem. And the urgent need to tackle it. Maritime shipping accounts for nearly 3% of the world’s annual CO₂ emissions, says the IMO. In 2018, IMO delegates agreed to cut emissions by 50% from 2008 levels by 2050. But with less than three decades to go, the target seems more unattainable than ever. Developing viable alternatives to diesel fuel is a more time-critical challenge than ever before. Can green ammonia solve shipping’s carbon crisis?

There’s no denying that the Suez Canal is the world’s most important waterway. The reason: about 12% of the global trade flowing through a single canal, one connecting two continents – Asia and Europe. The canal is so strategic that world powers have fought over the waterway since it was completed in 1869.