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Shipspotters all over the world => Shipping News and information => Topic started by: Richard Paton on February 13, 2012, 06:46:35 PM

Title: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Richard Paton on February 13, 2012, 06:46:35 PM
Hi all,

This may be a daft question but i was wondering what happens to the imo number sequence once they get to 99?  ???

Does it change to 00 or does it change to an 8 digit number as opposed to a 7 currently?

Cheers
Richard  :)
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Christian on February 13, 2012, 08:11:00 PM
I guess when old ship get scrapped and delated from register, some new vessel can get that IMO number... so in this case it never reaches 00 :)
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Tuomas Romu on February 13, 2012, 08:20:35 PM
I think they'll move to eight digits. After all, the great thing in the IMO number is that it's unique. If they start recycling it, you get the same problems as when you're recycling phone numbers. Someone calls you in the middle of the night and tells you to stop seeing his daughter. Except that it's a bit different with ships.
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Phil English on February 13, 2012, 08:21:30 PM
I guess when old ship get scrapped and delated from register, some new vessel can get that IMO number... so in this case it never reaches 00 :)

Absolutely not!

As mentioned here on Shipspotting many times, IMO numbers are unique and never get re-used. As for what happens when 99 is reached, It is likely that IHS Fairplay have provision in place for such an event, but they're unlikely to make it public at this stage.

Brgds
Phil
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Richard Paton on April 20, 2018, 07:47:37 PM
Now IMO numbers 98 are being issued, is there any update on this question some 6 years on?....just very curious! ;)
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: Captain Ted on April 20, 2018, 08:17:36 PM
may be a stupid question,but IMO numbers from 200 to 499 I never saw,,can they use them ?
Title: Re: imo number after 99 reached
Post by: davidships on April 21, 2018, 12:09:47 AM
There is no shortage of numbers and, as Phil says, they will definitely not be recycled.

There are over 10,000 "9" numbers left
A large number of "8" numbers have not been issued yet (they are used for allocations for ships which are not newbuildings)
I suspect that there are a good number of never issued "5,6,7" numbers
I think that only a few "3" or "4" numbers have been utilised
As far as I know "1" numbers are at present mainly used for yachts; also some of these and some "2" numbers have been used for small vessels outside the IMO system and only appear if that vessel subsequently applies for an IMO number (eg http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo_search.php?imo=2838358)
Some "invisible numbers" have been used for database purposes as temporary internal IDs
And of course, though there may be technical reasons not to use them, no "0"(zero) numbers have been used, that's another 99,999 more.