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When shipping containers sink in the drink
- hoppyhoppy2 4y agohttp://archive.today/fkheo http://archive.today/fkheo
- CalChris 4y agoI wonder why it’s not possible to route around weather. We have slowed shipping (Slow Steaming) because no one was willing to pay the extra fuel cost for the faster transits. We’re very good at nowcasting and forecasting weather globally and extremely good at it near coasts (COAMPS). Why not avoid these systems rather than plow through? Or is global marine trade like the wildebeest migrations in the Serengeti?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- IG_Semmelweiss 4y agoThe article talks about this directly. >>> More recently, the steep rise in demand for goods during the Covid era has meant that ships that once travelled at partial capacity now set off fully loaded and crews are pressured to adhere to strict timetables, even if doing so requires ignoring problems on board or sailing through storms instead of around them
- WheelsAtLarge 4y agoBottom line, cost, someone has done the math and has determined that it's cheaper to power thru than to try to re-route. Insurers could change this by refusing to insure under certain conditions but they've also concluded that it makes better financial sense to let the situation continue as it is now. I've come to the conclusion that if something that seems crazy continues to happen then the primary culprit is money. Not always, but it's up there.
- com2kid 4y agoIt could also be that the person in charge or scheduling gets a bonus for on time delivery and dinged for late deliveries but isn't punished for boats sinking. Misaligned incentives exist all around us.
- s1artibartfast 4y agoAligned incentives also exists all around us. I assume it is the case that lost containers are in fact acceptable.
- lazide 4y agoWell, insurers tend to go off hard data (they rarely go looking for trouble), and it takes a decent number of sunk ships to start being a statistically significant shift. Until then, it’s the same price.
- koheripbal 4y ago> the primary culprit is money. The primary reason is efficiency. Sometimes taking risks is more efficient. Efficiency may translate into money, but you are describing something as a vice, when it's not..
- tsol 4y agoNo one takes risks only for the sake of efficiency. They do so because taking risks to be efficient (can) make them more money. Efficiency for the sake of $$$
- thereisnospork 4y agoThat is the point of money, to measure and guage efficiency. To answer the question of 'Is the risk of losing a ship and all hands worth it?' one merely need check the actuarial tables.
- hulitu 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- IG_Semmelweiss 4y agoGreat article. Lots of shipping stories today on HN. One aspect that was left unaddressed and would be interesting to dive deeper is how containers create new ecosystems. This is true particularly in deep waters, where most lost stuff is reclaimed by the ocean, eventually becoming home for fish, and habitats where there was none.
- Maursault 4y ago> would be interesting to dive deeper is how containers create new ecosystems. This is true particularly in deep waters, where most lost stuff is reclaimed by the ocean, eventually becoming home for fish, and habitats where there was none. But look at the bright side. Seriously, while somewhat true that life is always amazing, I would expect, environmentally speaking, the sheer numbers of lost containers sitting on the bottom of the ocean is probably a net bad rather than a net good. Would be more interesting, though depressing, to see just what bad and how much bad, and how much of the ocean floor is left that isn't covered in containers.
- bombcar 4y agoLikely for much of them, lost in storms over deep ocean, it really does not much of anything at all - the area around the Titanic is mostly empty and lifeless.
- didericis 4y agoI think an even more interesting question is to delve into what exactly “net bad” or “net good” even means. Relative to what? I think we’ve been living in artificial environments for so long we’ve forgotten how much nature simply does not care and is not meant to be any particular way. It just is. Whether we are a part of the environment nature is adapting to is totally irrelevant from the perspective of other creatures, and we are both naive and solipsistic to think our notions of harm and no harm matter on an evolutionary timescale. Dropping containers into the bottom of the ocean is bad for us. It conflicts with the pristine natural environment we envision and the natural order we have been adapted to and find interesting, beautiful and wish to protect, and it feels like bad stewardship of a garden we wish to cultivate. That does not matter to nature. Different species within the ocean are in a constant battle for survival to adapt to anything and everything and containers are just another adaptational factor like any other. I am worried by the number of people that seem to think nature will reciprocate if we are nice to it. We should strive to protect the environment and not change it drastically for our own reasons, not anthropomorphize and treat it like a substitute God that will reward us if we make the proper sacrifices to it. This is a tangential rant not that related to what you’re saying, and I don’t know why a particular flavor of desire to protect nature as some kind of good in and of itself bothers me so much (which you may not hold in the manner that bothers me), but it does. I say that as someone who is currently bird watching while browsing hn by a marsh and loves evolutionary history and the study/protection of the natural world. I think maybe it’s because it diminishes where all of the stuff around us comes from and how we got here. Biological stuff is really, really, really old and been through environmental changes we can’t even imagine. I feel like a bunch of containers dropped in the ocean is like just another thing in a long, long, loooong history of all kinds of curve balls that contribute to the constant change that is the natural world.
- urgentmessage 4y ago
- bamboozled 4y agoYou know you're an IT person in 2022 when you read this title and immediately assume it has to do with Docker.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- winternett 4y agoI did that... First thought was "Oh no... What am I gonna need to patch now?"... :|
- ProAm 4y agoThey call that hubris
- aaron695 4y ago
- tomcam 4y agoRead the last sentence if nothing else.
- rkagerer 4y agoI tried, but with all the ads and the way stuff dynamically loads it's actually darn hard to target anything using a quick scroll. I miss the old, plainer web.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- croisillon 4y agoThe reader mode in Firefox comes handy. "Afterward, among the shells and pebbles and dragons, residents and beachcombers kept coming across some of the cargo: a million plastic bags, headed for a supermarket chain in Ireland, bearing the words “Help protect the environment.”"
- oldsecondhand 4y agoAre we sure it's plastic and not biodegradable (e.g. starch based)?
- hulitu 4y agoUntil they degrade a lot of fishes and birds will choke to death.
- tomcam 4y agoDumb of me not to do this. Thank you.
- pif 4y agoYeah, me too! I miss the days the web was about sharing information and not advertising apps.
- 4y ago