Identifying a stow position on a container ship
Hariesh Manaadiar
Shipping & Freight Expert || Trade Digitalisation || Business Architect || Industry Advisor, Consultant, Trainer || Founder @ Shipping and Freight Resource || Follow me for educational content and industry insights
Bob, one of the new exporters on the block had an issue with one of his shipments going to China and wanted that container taken off in Singapore which was one of the ports on the route to China..
But he was worried about the additional charges that would be incurred and wanted to know the costs that he may incur..
So he calls up his friendly neighborhood shipping line that he used for his shipment and speaks to Theo the friendly ops guy.. Theo listens to Bob's worries, takes down his container number, takes a few moments and hey presto, tells Bob exactly where his container is, how many containers are above Bob's container and how many containers needs to be restowed to get to Bob's container..
Like Theo, there are some people in the shipping industry who are able to identify where a container has been stowed on board of a ship just by reading the stow position (also known as cell position) and also whether it is a 20’ or a 40’ container that is stowed there..
How do they do this..?? Mainly based on experience in handling and reading stowage plans, and also using a pattern..
I will explain below..
For example, 090482 is an example of a stow position.. This is basically divided into 3 parts
09 / 04 / 82 – where 09 is the bay, 04 is the row and 82 is the tier – translated in English it means :-
Bay = each container vessel is split into compartments which are termed as Bay and depending on the size of the ship it will proceed from 01 to 40 (for example) where Bay 01 is the bay towards the Bow (the front) of the ship and Bay 40 is the bay towards the Stern (the back) of the ship..
Odd numbered bays (1,3,5 etc) means that it is a 20’ stow and Even numbered bay (2,4,6 etc) means that it is a 40’ stow..
Confused..?? No stress.. Click here for a detailed explanation.. You can also read how the entire process of stowage planning works here..
Transportation Planner, Strategist & Analyst
4 年Hariesh Manaadiar: The subject of stowage feeds into one of my pet peeves with the carriers, terminals, and port authorities, at least in regard to US West Coast operations. One of the latest buzzwords that's being thrown around quite a bit is "predictive analytics" and "predictive visibility." High tech and AI are being held out as the solution to determining the estimated time of discharge and making that information available to importers and their truckers. As one who pre-planned import intermodal operations in detail for all our vessels at LA/LGB, I had access to the stowage data the discharge sequence plans written up by the terminal's marine planners. Anybody doing this work is always determining when containers will be discharged--it's just a matter of how precise you need to be for your purposes. I had recommended to my company that we make estimated discharge times available 15 years ago. Any carrier or terminal can do this without any fancy "predictive" AI and it's a bloody crime that all terminals in LA/LGB aren't doing this (I'm only aware of one).
West-Med HUBs Operations Manager for Region South Europe presso Hapag-Lloyd AG
4 年That's my job!!!! I'm a ship planner and I can say that creating a load cargo plan is amazing!!!!!
Actively looking
4 年Interesting read, really. I learnt something new today ??
I used to work on such a program ! I just love it !
MANAGING PARTNER at MAGMA ASH TECH
4 年Nicely explained