4 Shipping Accidents that Could Have Used Marine Insurance

June 28, 2022

4 shipping accidents that could have used Marine Insurance

Transporting cargo, whether by land, sea, or air; is always a game of the universe flipping a coin. It’s very uncertain (no matter how much we try to make things as secure as possible), and it’s equal parts excitement and everyone just hurling as many prayers to their saints and deities as possible. Here are some of the times where humans lost the coin flip (and a lot of important cargo) and could have used marine insurance. Truck Down, Bottoms Up Beer and humans usually have a predictable routine whenever they encounter each other. The latter consumes varying amounts of the former and based on the said amount, can end up asleep. This whole dynamic has taken an unexpected development multiple times in the Philippines. In at least 2 separate instances in the past few years, trucks carrying loads of beer have toppled over and released copious amounts of alcohol on the streets. While a truly unfortunate turn of events, various citizens have taken it upon themselves to… “clean” the streets of that blasted alcohol. Lots of songs were sung on karaoke machines on those days; probably said cleaners celebrating a civic job well done. The Great Escape Speaking of trucks going belly-up, name one thing that could be worse to have in the cargo bed when your transport decides it’s time for a nap. That’s right; live animals. From pigs, to cows, to chickens, nothing is more unsettling than transporting a literal heap of live cargo. One of the most common mishaps seems to involve these animals just escaping their transports OR said transport getting into an accident and then whichever animals can still move just hightail it out of there. Unlike beer, it’s way harder to catch a very stressed out animal. Drunk… Sailing? We all know the Russian stereotype of their love for alcohol. Just a bunch of dudes downing shots of vodka while some guy named Dmitri or Vladimir tries to talk to a bear. Obviously, these are all very wrong and non-representative of Russian culture BUT, just like any other culture, Russians aren’t immune to drunken shenanigans. Enter the Seagrand, a Russian cargo ship that, back in February 2019, sailed into a South Korean bridge due to the ship’s captain being inebriated (almost three times the legal blood alcohol limit). Instead of sailing all the way north to Russia, the ship was steered westward into a small bay before doing a Godzilla on the Gwangan Bridge. Boat Boops Remember when you were a kid and you’d be in a pool or something surrounded by toy boats? What was your usual way of playing with these toy boats? That’s right! Ramming them against each other. In December of 2018, a French container ship named CMA CGM Norma kissed a Chinese cargo ship named Yusheng366. While the container ship suffered only minor damage, the cargo ship ended up sinking. While all these stories seem like comedic mishaps, do note that a lot of money and products were lost because of these unfortunate events. Pretty stressful, right? While you can’t control how the universe works, you CAN control your losses. Cocogen offers a myriad of transportation insurance products. For more information, shoot us an e-mail at client_services@cocogen.com, call us at (02)830-6000, and follow us on our social media!

*** The views expressed are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cocogen Insurance.

News and Events