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Some of this aricle reads as if the author is a little naiive as to how container ports work, and just assumes that the cargo industry hasn't thought about thes
by slapshot 16y ago
Some of this aricle reads as if the author is a little naiive as to how container ports work, and just assumes that the cargo industry hasn't thought about these problems. There's plenty of room for innovation in cargo, but don't pretend that the people involved have never thought of the problem of losing containers at sea.
For example, I'm a little surprised by their recommendation that RFID chips be added to containers to prevent mis-loading, as if the current practice is to just randomly grab containers from stacks waiting by the shore.
There is already very sophisticated software (MACS3, or more specifically SEALASH that calculates the force added by an extra container on top of the stack) that does this stuff. There are also programs that read the numbers on containers as they go on and off the vessels, so that they are loaded onto the right trucks at the destination at the right time. If heavy containers end up on top, it's because they need to be removed first or were delivered last---that's a problem that can be solved, but it's a more complex problem than just adding an RFID tag to everything.
- wmoser 16y agoI'm an engineer on a ship and while I don't work on a container ship, I took a cargo class in college. There are other considerations too, the software frequently accounts for things such as not putting chemicals that react poorly with each other near each other or things that may be hard to put out if they catch on fire near the top of stacks on the outside so they can be jettisoned in an emergency. Also, while no one weighs each container, its part of the process for people doing the shipping to say what is in it and how much it weighs. They can probably fudge the weight a little but the software takes into account the reported weight to make sure the ship has safe stability. Containers stored inside are dryer and less likely to be lost overboard which normally is a premium price for shipping too. Plus as you mentioned the logistics problem of not putting all the new stuff on top of stuff that gets taken off at an earlier port.
- pbhjpbhj 16y agoI wonder if it's possible to choose a route, time of year and container position that would almost guarantee container loss? Some people would be prepared to ship something a few times to have it lost at the bottom of the ocean I'm sure. Perhaps easier to just bribe the captain?
- wmoser 16y agoWell I suppose it depends on your intention? I mean scientists are dropping buoys and AUVs and what not in the water all the time, you might be able to convince one of them to toss it overboard for free. Also, there is a fairly big sub-industry of weather routing which have very sophisticated meteorological models and what not to help shipping companies route their ships around crappy weather to avoid losses to cargo and damage to ships. Some of the new ships though are so large that for the most part they're able to weather even the larger storms a bit better so they're just going through instead of around. Save some fuel, lose a container, probably an environmental tie.
- secretasiandan 16y agoI think you're misplacing/mistaking the emphasis of the article "As those awesome but not quite perfect systems get adopted on the global scale, we may face a host of strange and potentially dangerous results arise that we never saw coming." The RFID paragraph is 1 of 7. And while I know next to nothing about shipping, I feel comfortable saying RFIDs could still add something to the current system.