Minimal Ice Class requirements on the St-Lawrence river navigation. Baltic sea

[Jean Hemond]

It is a very well documented problem, water intake freezing in fresh water causing main engine to overheat and shut down. There is three things involved here:

 1- There is no ice regulations/requirements on the St-Lawrence river during winter,one would wonder why?, well it's easy, just ask the shipping federation about it and you'll get your answer, they don't want it...and they clearly told the goverment

 2- Some owner send vessel that are not designed for winter, no heat, no cooling recirculation, no gear for the crew... and so on !
 
3- As you all know so well, Foreing flag  vessel allows owners to hire whatever, whoever they want, under god knows what conditions... so you get what you pay for...On the MSC Tia, almost none on board (all Indian crew) had seen snow before...the poor chief engineer was overwhelmed by the situation.

...so who do you think gets stuck with the problem?, the crew and the pilots and in case of an accident,  the public, just imagine one of these ships going aground due to a black out...

Transport Canada knows about that.. they have known this for years... so what's going on ?...
What about a minimum ice class regulation like they have in the Baltic...?

In the end it's all about $$$... until one of them hits a bridge or makes a big mess !

But be sure that the pilots first priority is to ensure the safety of the navigation, the environment, the crew and the cargo.

Following T. Richard post about MSC TIA incident also the usual, frequent and similar happenings for 50, plus, years.
It might be well be that we now have here  an environmental disaster waiting to happen. Potentially, in the form of a major and problematic oil spill through ice floes.
Experts using the historical figures of incidents like the MSC TIA are now well in the  possibility of predicting the statistical probability of such a disaster happening. And I believe, also are able to predict its eventual impacts and costs. This study or similar should even be already in the hands of Canadian Ministry of Transport.

I am under the strong impression, that such an occurrence is rather high if ones take into account the number and size of tankers increasing on the St-Lawrence. Also to be added to those considerations are the minimalist channel maintenance and reduced icebreaker availability.

Such an accidental spill would for sure not only have very major impact on  Canadian environment and economics for the local shipping businesses.  But on top negative overall results would ensue on Canadian environmental politics and sovereignty.
That since the claim of  Canada over control on its Arctic Water passage is justified largely on environmental considerations.


 In the event of a major oil spill on the St-Lawrence for not having taken basic necessary preventive actions Canada would most certainly on international scale loose further face and clout.

This post is not prompted by blind environmental considerations, but rather through my interest in the well being of the Canadian shipping industry.

[Tuomas Romu]

In the Baltic sea ships with higher ice class pay less fairway fees, so they are an attractive option for shipping companies whose ships regularly call Finnish or Swedish ports. Would there be such "carrot" in Canada as well?

[Jean Hemond]

I am not a specialist in shipping economics,as such, but certainly additional ship requirements will cost money.
This service reduction would be positive and an easy way of going ahead with  minimal ice-class ship requirements!
Also in the same direction a few others helps from other sources might be implemented to force the growing and excessive heavy-load lorries off the  highways  that here are for most  parallel to the navigation channels.   
Restrictive measures must certainly be compensated in some form if the attractiveness of the St-Lawrence shipping routes is to be kept growing in view of competitive harbours and subsidized shipping systems.

[Mac Mackay]

Very interesting discussion. MSC Tia, with ill-prepared ship and crew is not new, as you say it has been going on for a long time. The first winter ships going to Montreal, the Helga Dan and the Russians were built for navigation in ice.
I believe there should be more restrictions - surely from the insurers, but also from the government. If not things will become worse and we will have the disaster everyone fears.
And I am sorry to say that we live in a time when changes are only made after the disaster occurs.