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December 2010 www.marinelink.com 21 the owner or operator. USCG The US Coast Guard recently issued a Policy Letter on the banning of substan- dard foreign vessels. Such banning has been ordered intermittently in the past, but a more formal protocol has now been established. A foreign vessel that has been detained three times within the pre- vious twelve months will be subjected to an International Safety Management (ISM) Code expanded examination if it is determined that failure to effectively implement the vessel’s Safety Manage- ment System (SMS) is a contributing fac- tor for the substandard conditions that led to the detentions. If the vessel fails its ex- panded examination following three de- tentions within the previous twelve months, a Letter of Denial will be sent to the vessel’s Owner and Company in- forming them that the vessel will be de- nied entry into any port or place in the United States unless specific actions are completed to the satisfaction of the US Coast Guard. The vessel’s flag adminis- tration and appropriate Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) secretariats will be notified of this action. These require- ments will not be impacted regardless of whether the vessel is sold, placed under new management, reflagged, or renamed. Upon satisfactory review of all the sub- mitted information required by the Letter of Denial, the Coast Guard will issue a Letter of Acceptance. Upon the vessel’s return to a port or place in the United States, it will be subjected to a Priority I Port State Control (PSC) Examination prior to entry. Only after satisfactory completion of the expanded examination will a previously banned vessel be al- lowed entry into a port or place of the United States. Previous instances where a vessel has been banned from entry into a port or place of the United States have generally been based on the order of a federal court following conviction of the owner or op- erator of a maritime-related criminal of- fense, such as falsification of an oil record book (ORB). Coast Guard records show that, as of September 1, 2010, three foreign vessels are currently banned from operating in the United States: (1) Cosette (IMO 6617025), a ro-ro cargo ship operating under the Bolivian flag; (2) Wilmina (IMO 9151840), a crude oil tanker operating under the Norwegian In- ternational Ship Register; and (3) Island Intrepid (IMO 7033161), a container ship operating under the flag of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. This list is subject to change without prior notice. Examination has not revealed any other port states or regional port state control organizations that have established for- mal protocols for the banning of substan- dard vessels. All of those states or organizations, though, have taken meas- ures to increase the level of inspections to which previously detained vessels are subjected upon re-entry into one of their ports. Measures for the banning of substan- dard vessels are a natural progression in the evolution of port state control pro- grams. When accompanied by adequate safeguards to ensure that the measures are targeted at vessels truly being oper- ated in a manner that places the crew, cargo, ship, and the environment at an un- acceptable risk, these steps will provide reputable owners and operators a level playing field in their commercial en- deavors.
