The Maritime Safety Committee
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Statutory Documents - IMO Publications and Documents - Circulars - Maritime Safety Committee - MSC/Circular.570 – Recommendation on Maximum Stowage Height of Survival Craft on Passenger Ships – (Adopted on 2 July 1991) - The Maritime Safety Committee

The Maritime Safety Committee

  .1 has noted that regulation III/13.1.2 of the 1983 amendments to the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), 1974, requires that each survival craft shall be stowed as near the water surface as is safe and practicable;

  .2 has also noted that SOLAS regulation III/13.1.2 closely specifies a minimum height for the stowage of survival craft;

  .3 recognizes the importance of the stowage height for survival craft on passenger ships being at a reasonably low level;

  .4 has observed a tendency in some passenger ship designs which result in survival craft being stowed at increasingly higher levels;

  .5 has also observed a trend in some recent passenger ship designs for survival craft to be stowed at a level which is more in keeping with the spirit of SOLAS regulation III/13.1.2;

  .6 welcomes this recent trend towards a lower level of stowage for survival craft in both cruise and ro-ro ferry passenger ships;

  .7 recalls that the means of escape requirements in SOLAS regulation II-2/28 provide an enclosed stairway to the embarkation deck, irrespective of whether it is on an upper or lower deck of the ship; and

  .8 concludes that problems associated with the stowage of survival craft at lower levels should not in most cases be insurmountable.

Parent topic: MSC/Circular.570 – Recommendation on Maximum Stowage Height of Survival Craft on Passenger Ships – (Adopted on 2 July 1991)
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