Don't put trust in your AIS

Sandy said:
If you miss an oil tanker you really need to go to SpecSavers, other opticians are available.
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Exactly. What you don't want to do is be run over by one mid-ocean because you were relying on your AIS rather than keeping a lookout.
 
Since failure to deploy AIS properly is not hard to detect, it behoves the authorities to sanction the companies and ships involved and effectively ban them from trading.
 
I think some ships have been turning off AIS due to piracy issues.
I don't think these ships are likely to go stealthily up the English Channel then mysteriously appear in Felixstowe or similar, so it's probably not much of a 'first world problem'.

Probably more of an issue if you sail in the 2/3 of the world which doesn't have sanctions against Russia, they ship oil there, change the label, stick it in a big tank with a bit of Nigerian oil, and then ship it 'legitimately' to 'the West'.

That's why diesel isn't £2 a litre any more.
 
I did read there was growing (data privacy) concerns about the free availability of AIS data via the websites/apps & volunteer receiving stations.
 
Would be a very naive ship captain who tried to do sanctions busting with substantial amounts of oil in a large tanker by simply switching off AIS.

I would be very surprised if the USA and others aren’t using satellites to monitor oil tanker movements to enforce sanctions, to from major oil depots and other “sensitive” locations. Any that suddenly do dark on AIS would be immediately flagged as suspicious and actively tracked by satellite and perhaps intercepted in international waters.
 
dunedin said:
Would be a very naive ship captain who tried to do sanctions busting with substantial amounts of oil in a large tanker by simply switching off AIS.

I would be very surprised if the USA and others aren’t using satellites to monitor oil tanker movements to enforce sanctions, to from major oil depots and other “sensitive” locations. Any that suddenly do dark on AIS would be immediately flagged as suspicious and actively tracked by satellite and perhaps intercepted in international waters.
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You'd be surprised how much of it goes on. One of the services the company I work for offers is analysis of the dark fleet. AIS often goes off, despite ships being required to transmit. It's not always dodgy but we track AIS breaks to work out which ones are.
Most of the 'sanctioned' oil being shifted is being done on non-EU ships and being sent to countries with, shall we say, slightly lower adherence to international norms. It is completely legal.
Where it gets interesting is when one of these tankers goes dark, parks up next to another tanker and does a ship-to-ship transfer, which muddies the origin of the cargo.
The main risk with illegally trading ships is that if they are breaking embargoes they are not insured. If there is an accident or spillage, the oil hits the fan.
 
dunedin said:
Would be a very naive ship captain who tried to do sanctions busting with substantial amounts of oil in a large tanker by simply switching off AIS.

I would be very surprised if the USA and others aren’t using satellites to monitor oil tanker movements to enforce sanctions, to from major oil depots and other “sensitive” locations. Any that suddenly do dark on AIS would be immediately flagged as suspicious and actively tracked by satellite and perhaps intercepted in international waters.
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Already done to monitor fisheries in the Southern Ocean.
 
johnalison said:
Since failure to deploy AIS properly is not hard to detect, it behoves the authorities to sanction the companies and ships involved and effectively ban them from trading.
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Okay, so you sanction Dodgy Owner Private Limited, registered to a P.O. Box in Panama, where the law prevents disclosure of directors. No joy there.
So why not sanction the ship? Well it has now been sold to a new company with no record of illegal trading. Can Dodgy Owner Private 2 Limited, registered to a P.O. Box in Panama, be held responsible for the illegal activities of a previous owner? Of course not.
Shipping is not a very transparent industry. Many ships are owned by single-ship shelf companies that are registered in opaque jurisdictions and fly the flags of open registries, as they like to be called.
I have colleagues whose whole job is trying to get to the bottom of who the real beneficial owners of ships are, often with little success. They recently found a number of dark fleet ships registered to a restaurant in South London.
 
dunedin said:
Would be a very naive ship captain who tried to do sanctions busting with substantial amounts of oil in a large tanker by simply switching off AIS.

I would be very surprised if the USA and others aren’t using satellites to monitor oil tanker movements to enforce sanctions, to from major oil depots and other “sensitive” locations. Any that suddenly do dark on AIS would be immediately flagged as suspicious and actively tracked by satellite and perhaps intercepted in international waters.
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Cloud cover.
 
newtothis said:
Okay, so you sanction Dodgy Owner Private Limited, registered to a P.O. Box in Panama, where the law prevents disclosure of directors. No joy there.
So why not sanction the ship? Well it has now been sold to a new company with no record of illegal trading. Can Dodgy Owner Private 2 Limited, registered to a P.O. Box in Panama, be held responsible for the illegal activities of a previous owner? Of course not.
Shipping is not a very transparent industry. Many ships are owned by single-ship shelf companies that are registered in opaque jurisdictions and fly the flags of open registries, as they like to be called.
I have colleagues whose whole job is trying to get to the bottom of who the real beneficial owners of ships are, often with little success. They recently found a number of dark fleet ships registered to a restaurant in South London.
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Sanction the lot. I’m in trouble if I buy stolen goods, so why not them?
 
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