30 Years Ago

A LOOK BACK AT DECEMBER 1990

HCB has written extensively over the past few years about the dangers posed by mis-declared and undeclared dangerous goods in the maritime supply chain, following a significant number of serious fires aboard containerships. Readers may perhaps be surprised to learn that this phenomenon is nothing new. Back in December 1990, Michael Newbery, claims director with the West of England P&I Club, wrote about the same subject, saying: “If only port and customs officials had X-ray eyes!”

One event that had prompted Newbery’s article was an incident aboard the containership Ever Group in Los Angeles earlier that year, when crew found noxious fumes coming from a container with drums of trimethyl phosphate. Although there were no injuries and little damage, the response caused the main container terminal at the port to be closed for 24 hours – a costly exercise. Newbery noted that some ports had begun to work together, using what were then new tools available through computerisation, but that – as ever – there were plenty of shippers willing to ignore the regulations in order to save time and money.

And, as now, it is very hard to bring those miscreants to justice, even after a major incident. “I know of only one case in 20 years when a [P&I] club has succeeded in a counter-claim against a shipper indulging in misdeclaration,” he said, worried that, without an effective incentive to stop doing it, the problem would only get worse. “I am sure that real improvements in the present situation are within our grasp if we seek solutions at the all-important port gates,” he offered, although thirty years on, those improvements are still very hard to realise.

Elsewhere in the December 1990 issue, HCB reported that the International Labour Organisation (ILO) had included the transport of chemicals in its new draft Convention on Safety in the Use of Chemicals at Work, using the argument that training was not covered in the UN Orange Book, though the modal transport regulations such as ADR and RID and national administrations did recognise the need to provide some direction.

HCB also noted that, while the ILO Convention, adopted in June 1990, covered training for those dealing with chemicals both in the workplace and in transport, the risks posed to the two sets of workers are different: transport workers are only generally exposed to chemicals in the event of an accident and, therefore, only acute risks are relevant, whereas those who deal with chemicals on a regular basis in the workplace may need to be alert to chronic hazards.

There were plenty in the industry that felt it would be appropriate for the UN Model Regulations to contain provisions on training and the Hazardous Materials Advisory Council (HMAC, now DGAC) had put forward a proposal for consideration by the UN Sub-committee of Experts during its 1991-92 biennium. As HCB said at the time, such a move would enhance the uniformity applied by the various modal authorities and enforcement agencies, while also providing guidance to those countries that had not as yet included training requirements within their national regulations.

HMAC’s proposal addressed three levels of training requirements: general awareness, function-specific training and commensurate safety training, though it did not foresee the idea of competency-based training and assessment.