15 JULY 2020 The Gulf of Guinea off West Africa is increasingly dangerous for commercial shipping, accounting for just over 90% of maritime kidnappings worldwide. Meanwhile ship hijackings are at their lowest since 1993, the IMB said. In total, IMB’s Piracy Reporting Centre recorded 98 incidents of piracy and armed …
Read More »Monthly Archives: July 2020
THE SOUTH ATLANTIC ANOMALY MAY GO BACK FAR LONGER THAN ANYBODY KNEW
24 JULY 2020 For years, scientists have been gripped by the existence of a strange anomaly weakening Earth’s magnetic field. It’s located in the midst of the South Atlantic ocean, extending all the way from South America to the west coast of southern Africa. This giant, puzzling expanse of reduced magnetic intensity …
Read More »CHINA REPORTS RECOVERY IN SHIPBUILDING VOLUMES IN ONGOING COMPETITION
23 JULY 2020 Despite reporting steep declines in the most recent quarter, Chinese shipbuilding is showing signs of recovery, possibly with the aid of the Chinese government, as the shipbuilding industry continues its competition with Korean shipbuilding. For the first six months of 2020, China reported a nearly 11 percent …
Read More »WORLD’S BIGGEST CRANE SHIP SETS ANOTHER RECORD
22 JULY 2020 The superlarge crane ship Sleipnir has set another record: the largest single-lift jacket removal. Last week, Sleipnir successfully lifted and removed the 8,100 tonne jacket for the Jotun-B platform in the Norwegian North Sea. The platform was installed in 1998 by the Heerema crane ship Thialf, which returned to the Jotun field …
Read More »BP EX-MANAGER GUILTY IN $4 MILLION SINGAPORE BRIBERY SCHEME
21 JULY 2020 A former manager working at the BP oil company operations in Singapore along with his co-conspirator a local Singapore businessman have both been found guilty in a bribery scheme involving nearly $4 million in payments. According to Singapore prosecutors in the case that lasted nearly two years, …
Read More »NORWAY INVESTS $2.4B IN CO2 CAPTURE AND SUBSEA STORAGE PROJECT
20 JULY 2020 Norway has received permission from the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) to proceed with a $2.4 billion investment in two large-scale carbon capture facilities, along with the infrastructure needed to transport and store the CO2 in subsea reservoirs. It is the largest single state aid award ever …
Read More »RECAAP: PIRACY ON THE UPSWING IN ASIAN WATERS
19 JULY 2020 The number of piracy and armed robbery incidents reported in Asian waters has more than doubled in the first half of 2020 compared to last year. There were 51 incidents reported from January to June this year compared with 28 for the same period in 2019. The …
Read More »NINE JAPANESE COMPANIES RESEARCH SHIP CARBON RECYCLING
18 JULY 2020 Nine Japanese companies have started the Ship Carbon Recycling Working Group as part of Japan’s Carbon Capture & Reuse (CCR) Study Group. The Working Group aims to explore the feasibility of the concept of utilizing methanation technology for zero-emission ship fuels. Carbon recycling, a method used to …
Read More »FIREFIGHTERS PUT OUT FLAMES ABOARD USS BONHOMME RICHARD; VESSEL’S FUTURE UNKNOWN
16 JULY 2020 Crews have extinguished all known fires aboard a U.S. Navy warship that burned for four days at its mooring in San Diego, a top admiral said on Thursday, but it was still unclear if the Bonhomme Richard could be saved. Firefighters were combing through the 844-foot-long (257-m) …
Read More »SHIPPING LOSSES CONTINUED DOWNWARD TREND IN 2019, ALLIANZ SAYS
15 JULY 2020 Asian waters accounted for a third of the shipping industry’s total losses at sea globally last year, even as shipping losses continued their declining trend, says marine specialty insurer Allianz Global. In their annual Safety & Shipping Review, Allianz tallied 41 total losses reported around the world in …
Read More »