Seaways Focus - August 2025
Safety and security at sea
by Captain John Lloyd FNI, Chief Executive of The Nautical InstituteGlobal travel helps bring a wider perspective to our understanding of events and developments in our industry. For me this was especially relevant during my visit to Singapore in July.
My schedule was aligned with the Global Aviation and Maritime Symposium (GAMS), organised by the Singapore Ministry of Transport (MOT), in partnership with the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) and the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA).
Key speakers delivered insights from a government perspective, but most interesting was to learn of the common issues being faced by the airline and shipping industries as we face the global challenge of decarbonising our transport sectors. Unusually there were two world leaders present from UN organisations: Mr Juan Carlos Salazar, Secretary General, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and Mr Arsenio Dominguez, Secretary General, International Maritime Organization (IMO).
"By focusing on what goes well we can ensure better, more effective shipping operations – as the OCEAN project shows us."
The conversation was about much more than fuels of the future. Equally high on the agenda was safety and security in the challenging world we face at present. With conflicts in several parts of the world, civilians are always innocent victims of attacks. In our own industry we were starkly reminded of this with the callous attacks in the Red Sea leading to loss of lives as well as the loss of ships.
Let me add the voice of The Nautical Institute to those deploring these cowardly attacks on mariners going about their peaceful business and with little choice than to be there. There at the wrong place, at the wrong time. But let us also criticise those ship operators who chose to send their ships into the region, consciously exposing the crews to unacceptable risk. Would they have put their own families on board those vessels?
Closer to home, I do want to return to our core activity of providing professional development support to our maritime community. We are approaching the end of the outstanding OCEAN project which has enabled us to focus on how we can embed best practices in watchkeeping and navigation. By focusing on what goes well we can ensure better, more effective shipping operations. One of our responsibilities is the dissemination and sharing of information – so let me take the opportunity to remind readers of the wonderful videos that form part of the output from the OCEAN project.
These videos are a great support for learning, are free of charge and a great credit to those involved in the project.