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The Cypriot-flagged bulk carrier Peace has been banned from entering Australian ports for three months for being unseaworthy, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) said earlier this week.
Peace is operated by Danaos Shipping, a company that also operates the container ship Suez Canal, which was the subject of a prolonged detention by AMSA in January 2024.
AMSA Acting Executive Director Operations Greg Witherall said Danaos Shipping's failures with Suez Canal gave the authority serious cause for concern about other ships operated by the company – leading the authority to increase the frequency of inspections.
"In January 2024, we issued Danaos Shipping with a formal letter of warning, urging the company to rectify the systemic issues [that] led to Suez Canal being detained in Australia that same month," Mr Witherall said.
Five months after AMSA issued the letter of warning to Danaos Shipping, Peace was detained in an Australian port for a lack of maintenance and serious deterioration of fixtures and fittings such as hatches.
"The state of Peace was so poor that it represented a very real and unacceptable risk to the safety of seafarers onboard and Australia's marine environment," said Mr Witherall. "Ships cannot be operated in this unseaworthy state."
Mr Witherall said the watertight and weathertight failures on Peace had catastrophic potential.
Peace was detained in Newcastle on May 31, 2024. The detention was lifted three days later following rectification of these deficiencies.
"Further action may be taken against the company itself should Danaos Shipping continue down this trajectory of operating unseaworthy ships," Mr Witherall said.
