Glossary
Maritime inspection glossary
The vocabulary of ship inspections, in plain terms. The regimes, the questionnaires, and the words that decide whether a vessel sails and who it carries cargo for.
Inspection regimes and processes
- Port State Control (PSC)
- The inspection of foreign ships in a country's ports to verify they meet international conventions such as SOLAS, MARPOL and MLC. Coordinated regionally through Memoranda of Understanding. PSC issues no score; serious deficiencies can lead to detention.
- SIRE 2.0
- OCIMF's tanker inspection programme, the report charterers read before loading cargo. Live since 2024, it uses a risk-based questionnaire backed by mandatory photographs and written responses. It issues no letter grade.
- RightShip
- A maritime risk platform used by charterers and cargo owners, strongest in dry bulk. Its RISQ inspection assesses a vessel's condition and management and feeds a safety score that charterers weigh when fixing cargo.
- CDI
- The Chemical Distribution Institute, which runs an inspection and database scheme for the safety and quality of chemical and gas tankers.
- Vetting
- The due diligence a charterer or terminal runs before trusting a vessel with cargo, drawing on regimes such as SIRE 2.0, RightShip and CDI alongside the charterer's own checks.
- Pre-vetting
- A structured self-inspection run against the standard a vessel faces next, before the official inspection, so issues are found while there is still time to fix them.
Questionnaires and frameworks
- CVIQ
- The Compiled Vessel Inspection Questionnaire used by SIRE 2.0. The question set is assembled from the vessel, its history and the operator, so two inspections are rarely identical.
- RISQ
- The RightShip Inspection Questionnaire: the structured question set a RightShip inspection is carried out against, covering condition, the management system and crew familiarity.
- TMSA
- The Tanker Management and Self Assessment programme, OCIMF's framework for a tanker operator's shore-side management. Increasingly linked to SIRE 2.0 outcomes and chartering eligibility.
- VIQ
- The Vessel Inspection Questionnaire, the fixed questionnaire SIRE used before SIRE 2.0 replaced it with the risk-based CVIQ.
Conventions and the ISM Code
- SOLAS
- The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea, the principal treaty on the safety of merchant ships.
- MARPOL
- The International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships.
- MLC
- The Maritime Labour Convention, the treaty setting seafarers' working and living conditions.
- STCW
- The International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers.
- ISM Code
- The International Safety Management Code, which requires a documented safety management system and tests whether procedures are followed in practice, not just written.
Bodies and instruments
- OCIMF
- The Oil Companies International Marine Forum, the industry body behind the SIRE programme and TMSA.
- Paris MoU and Tokyo MoU
- Regional Memoranda of Understanding that coordinate Port State Control among member states: the Paris MoU across Europe and the North Atlantic, the Tokyo MoU across the Asia-Pacific.
- Flag state
- The country in which a ship is registered, responsible for ensuring it meets international conventions.
- Classification society
- An organisation that sets and verifies technical standards for the construction and condition of ships. Many also act as Recognised Organisations for flag states.
- Recognised Organisation
- A classification society authorised by a flag state to carry out statutory surveys and issue certificates on its behalf.
Key terms
- Ship Risk Profile
- Under the Paris MoU, a profile built from vessel type, age, flag performance, the recognised organisation and the company's inspection history. It decides how often a ship is targeted for PSC and how detailed the inspection is.
- Detention
- An order from a Port State Control authority that a ship may not sail until serious deficiencies are rectified. The record is permanent and raises the ship's future inspection exposure.
- Deficiency
- A finding recorded during an inspection where the ship does not meet a requirement. Deficiencies range from minor items to grounds for detention.
- Observation
- In SIRE 2.0, a recorded comment where the evidence does not fully satisfy a question. Operators can respond through OCIMF's channels.
- Designated Person Ashore (DPA)
- Required by the ISM Code: the shore-side link between the vessel and the company's top management, with direct access to ensure safety and pollution prevention.