North of England Club has noted that vessels on passage to some European ports were increasingly being requested by charterers to divert to an intermediate port to remove fumigants from the cargo holds, prior to the final discharge port.
This mostly concerned vessels carrying Ukrainian and South American grains heading to the Dutch discharge ports of Rotterdam or Amsterdam, the club said. In these cases, charterers had requested the vessel divert to Cadiz, Spain (although other intermediate ports had also been referenced), stating that they wished to remove the fumigants in order to avoid delays due to strict requirements at the discharge port.
North noted that some European countries, such as the Netherlands, did indeed have strict requirements on fumigant gases levels in the holds.
On arrival (typically at anchor), appointed chemists would measure the amount of residual fumigant gas remaining in the holds. This must be less than 1 part per million (ppm) to allow discharge to commence. If found to be 1ppm or greater, the vessel must remain at anchor, ventilating where possible to lower the fumigant gas level to less than 1ppm. North’s correspondent in the Netherlands, Dutch P&I Correspondents, have reported
that in some cases this had taken up to three weeks.
To avoid such potential delays, charterers were requesting that the fumigation sleeves be removed earlier, to allow the holds to be ventilated for the remaining passage and to increase the chances of residual fumigant gases being less than 1ppm at time of discharge.
It was also reported that, when measuring the residual gas levels in the holds and on deck, some authorities request the gas monitoring records taken on passage, as described in the IMSBC Code section 3.6. On occasion, these records have been found to be poor or not completed, leading to further delays and the potential for fines.
North said that if operators were requested to call at an intermediate port for the removal of fumigant sleeves, operators should consider:
North reminded members that removal of spent fumigants should not be carried out by the crew.
When removing fumigants at an intermediate port, North said that members should consider:
The instruction to divert the vessel to allow the removal of fumigants at an intermediate port would usually come from the charterer as a result of a commercial decision by them to attempt to prevent delays at the discharge port which would be for their account.
However, such a diversion was likely to constitute a deviation under the bill of lading contact, which could result in a loss of P&I cover for the carrier.
“/carrier Members who are requested by charterers to undertake such a diversion should therefore approach their usual P&I contacts at the Club to discuss the operation and to assess any potential impact on cover”, North said..
