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Resolutions, detoxes and diets...How's it going? Are you living in a haze of green smoothies and dawn yoga sessions, or have you fallen off the wagon and eaten half the crew mess Pringles?

Crew retention is generally perceived to be one of the biggest headaches in the yachting industry, yet cited as one of the most important factors in maintaining an efficient and happy ship.

Last month’s news was that the crew on the 31m M/Y La Dolce Vita had to abandon their burning yacht off the Florida Keys before fire totally gutted it and the yacht sank. Other than the watches on their wrists and the smartphones in their pockets, they may not have managed to take many other of their personal belongings with them when they abandoned the yacht.

This was not a unique occasion when yacht crew have been unexpectedly separated from their personal effects in a traumatic manner. A brief online search will reveal a series of other yacht fires and founderings, including some very large yachts. Recently, the 75m S/Y Enigma burned out and sank off Langkawi. The 60m M/Y Yogi sank in heavy weather in the Aegean in February 2012.

Nearly 5 years ago, the IMO issued guidelines to all its member states aimed at introducing Electronic Certificates to the maritime industry. The aim was to reduce the administrative burdens caused by reliance on traditional paper certificates. e-Certificates are intended to eventually replace paper certificates across the industry.

Read the letter from our CEO about the Joint Statement on prioritization of COVID-19 vaccination for seafarers and aircrew.

IMO Resolution MSC,428 (98) requires all SNS systems to include measures to ensure cyber security by the 2021 annual verification date. 

The paper side of this requirement, namely the insertion of new procedures into a current SMS, or the writing of a separate cyber SMS, only goes part way to meeting the intent of the IMO Resolution. The operational aspect is another story.