NRL Hosts Shipboard Fire Robotics Consortium
The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research (LASR), partner in the Navy's Damage Control for the 21st Century project (DC-21), recently hosted robotics research teams from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) and the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) to demonstrate the most current developments of advanced autonomous systems to assist in discovery, control, and damage control of incipient fires. Fighting fires…
U.K. P&I Club Medicals Cut Down on Claims
Insurance claims arising from pre-existing medical conditions among seafarers are almost non-existent from those passing the U.K. P&I Club's Crew Risk Management Project medical examination. The 42,000 successful crew candidates have yielded just 106 repatriation cases in the six years since the program started. In only one case was the claim related to a pre-existing medical defect. According to Daniel Lee, the program's director, this has been a major achievement. provided a free health check for seafarers and advice on treatment for the unfit. He was speaking to delegates from some of the world's leading ship managers at the Lloyd's Ship Manager Conference in Cyprus on October 10th.