• A total of 42 participants attended the 13th CINS Members Meeting in Hamburg on 3 December 2019.
  • The Meeting was generously hosted by IUMI – the International Union of Marine Insurance – who provided lunch and refreshments throughout the day.
  • ASD, whose office was the venue for the Meeting, kindly sponsored the “Welcome Reception” on the previous evening, a chance for informal “pre-conference” networking.

Participants were welcomed to the Meeting by Dieter Schwampe, Partner, Arnecke Sibeth Dabelstein (top). And by Lars Lange, Secretary-General of IUMI (below)


Morning presentations covering CINS activities, projects, data-inputting and guidelines

  • CINS Chairman Uffe Ernst-Frederiksen (Maersk Line) opened the Conference with a review of CINS Progress – covering the work undertaken since the last meeting in June.
  • He presented details of the projects and activities agreed at the previous day’s Board Meeting and reported on CINS plans

Uffe Ernst-Frederiksen opens the CINS Meeting

Cargo Inspection Programmes

  • Ian Lennard, President, National Cargo Bureau, and Uffe Ernst-Frederiksen gave a status report on the Container Inspection Programme which NCB has been undertaking – and indicated next steps.
  • Dirk Vande Velde gave participants an update on the MSC Inspection System

Ian Lennard – President, National Cargo Bureau

Reporting and Analytics

  • James Douglas (Exis Technologies) presented the new simplified method of reporting incidents, which reduces the input screens from two to one.
  • He also gave an analysis of the Incident Reporting over recent months, giving details of the average number of incidents per month, the number of CINS members who are reporting and their level of participation. He covered leakage by packing type and issues relating to the reporting of mis-declaration.
  • Finally, he confirmed that, in order to support the current and future use of the CINS stowage guidelines, Exis will supply and maintain the Hazcheck Risk Zone (RZ) Data free-of-charge. (See separate news item)
  • The free data supplied includes: UN number, Packing Group, Risk Zones (RZ) and a notes field in a CSV format. The Hazcheck Risk Zone Data can be automatically downloaded from the Exis website on entry of contact details and once terms and conditions have been accepted: https://hazcheck.existec.com/hazcheck-systems/hazcheck-risk-zone-data.aspx.

James Douglas, Exis Technologies

External presentations made at the CINS Meeting

  • After lunch, there were four external presentations at the CINS Meeting.

Liability Issues

  • Olaf Hartenstein and Esther Mallach from Arnecke Sibeth Dabelstein discussed liability issues for mis- or non-declared cargo in containers – from both the German and International legal perspective
  • They explained the liability of shipper/cargo owner/forwarder (or others) for mis- or non-declared cargo in containers and the damages arising from this non- / mis-declaration.

Olaf Hartenstein and Esther Mallach from ASD discussed liability issues

Loss Prevention

  • The cargo and container related loss prevention work of GDV (the German Insurance Association) was presented by Uwe Schieder, Loss Prevention Manager, GDV
  • He reviewed the loss prevention work undertaken over the past 25 years, including: stowing and lashing, flexitanks, cargo information, the German online information system “TIS”

Uwe Schieder, Loss Prevention Manager, GDV

Firefighting – 1

  • An innovative system for fighting fires in containers on-board vessels – both at deck level and at heights – was presented by Martin Winkel of Rosenby Engineering
  • He explained how the HydroPen System – a direct and fully automatic container firefighting solution – is operated and can be used for extinguishing fires inside a container

Martin Winkel – Rosenby Engineering

Firefighting – 2

  • Finally, Penelope Cooke, Managing Scientist at Brookes Bell, asked delegates to consider new approaches to fires on-board ships
  • She asked what we might like if the industry was starting now, and posed the question – “What we have now – is it working?”
  • Proposed changes required: retrofitting new technologies, “defensive” firefighting, a new attitude and the SOLAS regulation

Penelope Cooke, Managing Scientist, Brookes Bell