@Cornelia
Maersk has the same problems with cracks than others have too. They have however a better after construction support system. The first E-class had a lot after-fixes, because of cracks. I remember in 2007 when I was in R-dam inbound and one of the big ones at anchor, I think it was the Emma, and the pilot told me he was there the day before and he heard that
techs were a/b and worked on cracks. Has a lot to do with public relations and Maersk is good on that. Others are not as good or don,t care that much. When I was on the container ships, cracks were the norm, mostly not dangerous usually or not serious in that matter that the ship was threatened to come apart but fixable and specially then when it was right away attended too which we did. Some don,t.
But one thing I firmly believe that we did not see the end of it.
There is also another view to the whole cracking and the causes. How the companies let for example Captain,s handle bad weather situations.
Some companies are known when ships falling out of schedules then the Capt,s head is on the chopping block, ergo, they go high speeds as long as possible. You won,t believe what kind of inquiries from charterer offices coming to a ship when the vessel is delayed by bad weather. Asking for more speed is the least. Another thing is the distribution of cargoe,s during loading and discharging. (also when now the ships go slower in general)
Or the experience of crews. When I was young I hardly can remember that I had a Capt under 40, today it is not unusual to be under 30 !!!! No time to gain experience.
Construction another reason, I was as AB on a ship, the engineer in charge during construction sailed with us the first 2 month. He inspected everyday something and then again and wrote down. Today that is not done anymore because construction is planned by computers and not experienced engineers !!!
Also, the confinement to construction plans. Every change from the plans cost extra money and usually big. That,s the reason why you can be on a ship and see something bad and you sail another ship, which is 3 years younger, but the same class and the SAME problem. i.e. problems are not really fixed but more ignored.
And, last but not least, the majority of ships builded in the last 10 years had one thing in common: to be builded as quick as possible. I saw ships where welding crews were still aboard during the maiden voyage !!!!
In ports
The bending and shear moments are usually ignored, can not even be controlled by ships side because you have only the arrival condition and departure condition , there is no in-between condition. Impossible to do when a ship is discharged by 6 gantry cranes at the same time. However, I can say, sailed in charter for CSAV/HAPAG/H-SUED/MSC and also Maersk, the H-Sued and Maersk doing a better job than others with the planning of loading and discharging. I attribute just that a lot to the crack problems, not understanding when and how to reduce at sea and loading/discharging in ports.
For both are no examples to go by. These big ships at sea, force 7 is not even felt beside
that the waves still hitting the ship, and force 7 with good swell produces easy 3-5m waves,,thats enough to make material i.e. steel brittle over time in combination with the cargo operations
There are a lot of factors coming together, which it is, nobody ever can tell,,most probably it is a combination of all
