Ship safety department
The Ship Safety Service is an organizational unit of the Berufsgenossenschaft Verkehrswirtschaft Post-Logistik Telekommunikation (BG Verkehr) and was created on January 1, 2010 through the merger of the See-Berufsgenossenschaft with the professional association for vehicle maintenance to become the professional association for transport and traffic management.
The agency performs state tasks in the field of ship safety, marine environmental protection, maritime labor law and maritime medicine. In contrast to the other departments of the trade association, the agency is not financed from contributions from the member companies of the trade association, but from fees and funds from the federal budget. The Ship Safety Service has the legal status of a higher federal authority through the Maritime Tasks Act and the Maritime Labor Act . Technical supervision is carried out by the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure and, in the area of maritime labor law, by the Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs .
Ship safety
The agency monitors compliance with international and national regulations on ship safety, including on the manning of ships, the training of seafarers ( STCW Convention ), the ISM Code and the freeboard .
Marine environmental protection
The agency is responsible for compliance with the provisions of the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL Convention) on German- flagged ships and, within the scope of port state control, also on foreign-flagged ships. In addition, the testing and certification body of the ship safety department is responsible for the approval of systems for marine environmental protection.
Port State Control
As part of the Paris Memorandum of Understanding on Port State Control , the Ship Safety Service is also responsible for port state control . This means that a certain percentage of ships sailing under a foreign flag are checked when entering a German port. Not only the official documents and the people on board the ship are checked, but also compliance with the relevant safety regulations and standards in the field of environmental protection.
Maritime Labor Law
The agency is responsible for the state enforcement of maritime labor law in Germany. All merchant ships flying the German flag are regularly inspected by surveyors from the office to ensure that working and living conditions are observed. Larger seagoing vessels on international voyages with a measurement of over 500 GT are checked every two and a half years, larger fishing vessels every two years and all other vessels every three years.
The agency also checks private employment agencies based in Germany who place seafarers. The agency is also the central complaints office for seafarers.
Testing and certification body
The testing and certification body is u. a. also responsible for the approval of equipment in the area of life-saving appliances and fire protection in accordance with Directive 96/98 / EC on marine equipment. In order to be allowed to market products for commercial shipping , every manufacturer must, in addition to successfully carrying out the corresponding type tests, also inspect or regularly audit the respective production facility by the certifier (in this case the ship safety department as the notified body ). In the field of life-saving appliances, the service also carries out prototype testing of new lifeboats, lifeboats, mass evacuation systems and distress signals (pyrotechnics).
Maritime medicine
The Maritime Medical Service is based in Hamburg . It is the central federal agency for all matters relating to maritime medicine and, among other things, performs the following tasks:
- Control and quality assurance of the medical fitness examinations ,
- Control and quality assurance of the medical examinations of the sea pilots,
- Management of the Committee for Medical Equipment in Maritime Shipping ,
- Approval of medical repeat courses,
- Registration of ship doctors who work on merchant ships flying the German flag,
- Publication of instructions for medical care on merchant ships .