Classification and State Regulation Shipping Registration

State Regulation.

In Great Britain the State maintains con trol in matters concerning the safety of life at sea, while leaving much to the sea-faring interests as far as the safety of ship and cargo is concerned. Thus, for instance, while the classification cer tificates of Lloyd's Register are accepted as sufficient evidence that the vessel, her machinery and equipment are in a proper sea worthy condition, yet when it comes to the provisions for the safety of crew and passengers the Marine Department of the British Board of Trade sees that proper provision is made for (a) the accommodation for crew and emigrants; (b) boats and life-saving appliances; (c) wireless, navigation fittings and control; (d) the carriage of special cargoes such as wood, grain and coal; (e) the marking of the proper load line of a cargo ship, and (f) the subdivision of passenger vessels.

Authority is given to the Board of Trade by the Merchant Ship ping Acts of 1894 to prepare and to administer regulations neces sary for safety at sea, of which the principal are those relating to the marking of a load line.

Loadlines:

(a) Cargo Vessels.—The loadline is not a modern feature, for the vessels of the Italian republics probably before A.D. had a mark printed on their sides to indicate that the ship should not be loaded beyond this point. The Sardinian mark was the centre of a painted ring—practically the same as to-day. The modern story of the loadline is less than a century old, for about 1835 the committee of Lloyd's proposed that a freeboard of 3 inches per foot depth of hold should be used as a guide for safe loading. The freeboard or free side was the vertical distance from the upper (i.e., the top continuous) deck to the waterline, and Lloyd's rule approximately stated that this freeboard should be of the depth of the ship. While other rules were also tried, the first definite proposal to deal logically with the relation of freeboard to size and type of ship was sent by the Institution of Naval Architects to the Board of Trade in 1867. In 1871 a Merchant Shipping Act was passed requiring a scale of feet to be marked at the bow and stern showing the draught, and author izing the Board of Trade to appoint persons to record the draught of water of vessels leaving port. Lloyd's Register of Shipping, in about 1873, required what were known as Awning Decked Vessels to have a maximum loadline marked. In 1874 the Royal Com mission on Unseaworthy Ships dealt with the question of load lines, and under the stimulus of Samuel Plimsoll three Merchant Shipping Acts were passed by parliament in 1874-75-76, which together brought the freeboard question to a definite position.

(The sailor to-day regards the freeboard mark as the "Plimsoll" line.) These acts required the owners of foreign-going ships to mark the position of the upper deck line and to mark also a cir cular disc showing the maximum draught to which they claimed to load, while the distance between the deck line and the centre of the disc was recorded and inserted in the agreement with the crew.

While by the act of 1873 the Board of Trade were given power to detain overladen ships, yet without certain rules for guidance as to what constituted an overladen vessel the surveyors at the ports were in an impossible position. In order to remove these difficulties Benjamin Martell, the chief surveyor to Lloyd's Regis ter, suggested in 1874 a series of tables of freeboard based on actual experience with British vessels. The Board of Trade in 1875 called a conference with Lloyd's Register which laid down as principles that—(i.) There should be an enclosed buoyant volume above water which should be a certain proportion of the volume of the ship below water; (ii.) There should be a certain height of the exposed deck at particular places (known as "height of platform") such as at the forecastle and bow, at the stern, and at the bridge or navigating position; (iii.) The construction of the vessel should be sufficiently strong, and all exposed openings in the main or weather deck should be properly closed.

The question of tables, based on these principles, was further examined by Lloyd's Register in 1882 and by the Board of Trade which appointed the first loadline committee in 1883. This com mittee drew up a set of tables which was adopted voluntarily in 1885 and made compulsory by the Merchant Shipping Acts of 189o. Authority was given by the Board of Trade to Lloyd's Register, the Bureau Veritas, and the British Corporation to fix the freeboards on behalf of the Government. The Rules and Tables drawn up in 1890 have served since that time as the basis of freeboard; they have been examined and adjusted on several occasions principally in 1898 and in 1906, in which latter year the Merchant Shipping Acts were amended to apply to all foreign vessels using British ports. In 1908 an arrangement was made with Germany to adjust the differences between the practice of the two nations. As a consequence those tables have not only remained in force but have been adopted by all the maritime countries.