Thickness Measurement for Ships in the Dardanelles at Çanakkale

Inspection services for ships at Çanakkale

Each service has its own page with the method, the class requirements and what the report contains.

Where a ship can be gauged at Çanakkale

The anchorages are the most useful venue, as well as the most demanding. A ship at anchor can be boarded by launch arranged through the agent, then worked while it waits. The tidal stream through the strait makes the ship swing and the launch's approach difficult at some states of the current, so the agent's local advice decides the timing of each transfer. A prioritised scope keeps the job useful even if the ship is called to move: deck plating, hatch covers and coamings, air pipes, ballast tanks that the crew has prepared and certified, and any item raised by a recent inspection.

Alongside, the scope widens. At the commercial quay and the private terminals, bulk carriers can have holds gauged once cargo is out and the crew has cleaned them. Tanker work is limited to deck, certified ballast tanks and deck piping unless cargo tanks are cleaned and gas-free. For ships that need a dry hull, the plan is to gauge at Çanakkale first and send the readings ahead to a yard on the Marmara or in the Aegean, so the steel estimate is ready when the ship is booked in. A short job at Çanakkale can therefore be one stage of a longer programme.

• Dardanelles anchorages — deck, hatch cover, air pipe and ballast tank gauging on ships waiting for pilots or transit slots, reached by launch
• Çanakkale town quays — bulk and general cargo ships gauged after discharge, with holds, coamings and decks on the list
• Private terminals along the strait — hold and deck gauging on bulk carriers serving industrial plants, within each terminal's rules
• Fuel and liquid berths — deck, deck piping and certified ballast tanks on small tankers
• Small yard slipways and repair quays — tugs, workboats and coasters gauged when hauled out or alongside for repair
• Handover to a Marmara or Aegean yard — readings carried forward into a docking steel estimate

The Turkish Straits regime and port state control

Ships transiting the Dardanelles and calling at Çanakkale come under Turkey's maritime authorities, with the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure and the harbour master responsible for port state control under the Black Sea and Mediterranean MoUs. The Directorate General of Coastal Safety runs the traffic service and pilotage for the strait. Ships that arrive here have often just come from the Black Sea or from an Aegean port where an inspector has already looked at them, so deficiency records from the previous call are worth reading before planning a scope at Çanakkale.

For older tonnage on Black Sea and Aegean trades, the strait is a pinch point where waiting time and structural condition meet. A bulk carrier at its fourth renewal survey may sit at the anchorage for hours with wasted hatch coamings that an inspector has already noted, and a superintendent will want readings before the ship reaches the yard. Ships bound for EU ports must carry a valid Inventory of Hazardous Materials and are subject to carbon reporting there, so owners keep gauging records current for the hull file.

Wherever a ship is outside a sulphur emission control area, the global 0.50% sulphur cap applies, and many of the ships calling at Çanakkale meet it with an exhaust gas cleaning system rather than compliant fuel. Scrubber wash-water piping, the overboard discharge and the hull penetration around it corrode quickly in service, especially on open-loop systems, and are worth adding to the gauging scope.

How a thickness measurement job runs at Çanakkale

A gauging job at Çanakkale runs the same way whatever the ship type. The sequence below is what the superintendent, the attending surveyor and the yard can expect from us.

Çanakkale has a domestic airport, but most travel runs through Istanbul, with the team continuing by road around the Marmara or along the Gelibolu peninsula, or by sea and ferry connections where convenient. The ship's agent arranges quay passes, launches for the anchorages and the terminal's gas-free and permit requirements, and receives crew lists, technician certificates and equipment details beforehand. Technicians from India need a Turkish visa, and because strait delays are unpredictable, we apply early and keep the visa period flexible.

• Send the vessel name or IMO number, ship type, class society, the survey due (annual, intermediate, renewal survey number, CAP or owner's condition survey), the port and dates, and the scope you expect.
• We confirm the scope against the class rules for that survey, prepare the thickness measurement plan with frame and section references, and say whether the measurement will be credited to a class survey.
• Mobilisation is planned around visa lead times and the vessel's schedule; the ship's agent arranges port access, and the yard or ship arranges staging, lighting, ventilation and gas-free certificates.
• Gauging with calibrated ultrasonic thickness gauges: through sound coatings only where the gauge's through-coating mode has been verified on a coated reference, otherwise on cleaned bare steel, with every reading tied to its frame, strake and location on the sketch.
• Readings are compared with original thicknesses as work proceeds; substantial and excessive corrosion and any cracks are reported to the attending surveyor and the superintendent the same day.
• The final report is issued on the class thickness-measurement formats with sketches, a summary of locations exceeding the allowable margins, piping tables where piping was in scope, and the gauge calibration and technician certificates.

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