Ships and Sundry Watercraft

Jul 29, 2012
17,654
6,350
Canada
Valvebounce said:
Hi Click.
It appears that you have found the urban legend number, (of course it could be that I have found the urban legend rebuttal!) :eek: ::) :)
Excerpt from this page http://www.southernfriedscience.com/busting-ocean-myths-how-many-containers-are-really-lost-at-sea/
Fortunately, it’s pretty hard to hide a missing container and the number of containers lost at sea is actually much lower than 10,000. In 2011 and 2014, the World Shipping Council surveyed it’s members to find out exactly how many containers are lost at sea each year. What they found was that not only was the number of lost containers an order of magnitude less than the 10,000 figure, but that the average was driven up by two catastrophic accidents–the sinking of the MOL Comfort and the grounding of the MV Rena.
Between 2008 and 2013, and excluding these two maritime disasters, an average of 546 containers were lost at sea. When Comfort and Rena are added to the equation, that number climbs to 1,679 containers per year. The MOL Comfort, which broke in half on June 17, 2013 and subsequently sunk during a prolonged attempt to recover her stern, was the worst container ship disaster in history: 4,293 containers were lost in a single incident. The MV Rena grounded on a reef of the New Zealand coast in late 2011, spilling 900 containers over the side.


Thanks for encouraging me to go looking, I found it quite an interesting journey getting to this information.

Cheers, Graham.

Hi Graham,

Thank you for this information. :)

These numbers seem more reasonable.

Cheers

Click
 
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Valvebounce

CR Pro
Apr 3, 2013
4,555
450
57
Isle of Wight
Hi Click.
Considering the opening line of the article,
"10,000 is one of those numbers that’s big enough to be surprising, but not so huge to inspire immediate incredulity." I must be different (people often tell me I'm special) because I suffered from "immediate incredulity" and had to go look for an explanation.
I'm glad 10,000 is not true, think of the cost to commerce if it were, however when you read the total number of containers that are shipped each year it is almost surprising that the number is not higher, so I think it makes it even more surprising that the number is lower!

Cheers, Graham.
Ps I got so carried away I forgot to say "Great shots Folks."

Click said:
Hi Graham,

Thank you for this information. :)

These numbers seem more reasonable.

Cheers

Click
 
Upvote 0