Ship Thickness Measurement and Hull Inspection in Klaipėda

Inspection services for ships at Klaipėda

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

Gauging locations in and around Klaipėda

In the floating docks at Western Shipyard, gauging starts as soon as the ship is out of the water and the first areas are cleaned and staged. Access equipment, cleaning and gas-freeing come from the yard; the order in which we measure follows where the surveyor expects renewal, so those compartments are reported first. Ships that arrive with a pre-docking gauging report done at an earlier call need less time for this, because the surveyor can verify rather than wait.

Along the cargo terminals, gauging follows the ship's cargo plan. Container feeders and ro-pax have scheduled calls, so their scopes are prepared in advance and split across visits. Bulk carriers are measured hold by hold, and tankers at the KN oil terminal on deck and piping under the permit system, with the cargo tanks deferred until gas-free. Permanently moored units such as the LNG terminal present a different problem: there is no dry-docking to wait for, so hull and piping gauging has to be fitted into continuous operation. Ships at anchor are reached by launch through the agent, usually for pre-docking readings before they enter the yard.

• Western Shipyard (BLRT Grupp) — floating docks on the strait; ESP and other renewal-survey gauging with daily read-outs to the yard and class
• Container and general cargo terminals along the Klaipėda Strait — feeder and multipurpose ships; hatch covers, coamings, decks and ballast tanks measured in the hours of each call
• Ro-pax terminal — DFDS ferries to Kiel and Karlshamn; staged gauging of vehicle decks, ramps and voids during turnarounds and lay-by
• KN oil terminal — product tankers alongside; deck and pipeline gauging cleared through the terminal and the ship before it starts
• LNG terminal area — the moored FSRU and visiting LNG carriers; ballast tanks, deck and sea water lines gauged while the unit keeps operating
• Klaipėda anchorage — ships lying outside the port until the yard or a terminal can take them; reached by a launch the agent organises

Lithuanian regulation and energy-market context

Lithuania applies Paris MoU port state control. On emissions, Klaipėda sits under two Baltic regimes: the SOx ECA's 0.10% fuel sulphur cap, and NOx Tier III requirements for ships built from 2021. Scrubbers are common on the feeders and ro-ro tonnage calling here, which makes their discharge lines and shell connections a routine item to measure during calls or dockings. Emissions on voyages to and from Klaipėda have been subject to the EU ETS since 2024, and the ships' energy use to FuelEU Maritime since 2025, and both make the steel renewal decision at a docking a sharper commercial question for owners of older ships.

Energy security has shaped the port. The LNG terminal and the Būtingė crude terminal gave Lithuania import routes independent of pipelines from the east, and they bring LNG carriers and crude and product tankers whose owners face vetting and, for older tankers, CAP requests. Bulk carriers docking at Western Shipyard are ESP ships, single-skin designs under IACS UR Z10.2 and double-skin under Z10.5, and their renewal-survey gauging grows at each five-year cycle. ESP gauging in Lithuania is therefore concentrated in the docks, while deck and piping work on tankers is done at the terminals.

Ships trading to Klaipėda are inside a sulphur emission control area, where fuel must not exceed 0.10% sulphur unless an exhaust gas cleaning system (scrubber) is fitted. Scrubber wash-water piping, the overboard discharge and the hull penetration around it are among the fastest-corroding parts of a modern ship, so they belong in the gauging scope at every docking and, on open-loop systems, between dockings.

How a thickness measurement job runs at Klaipėda

The sequence for a thickness measurement job at Klaipėda is short and written down, so the yard, the surveyor and the superintendent know who arranges what.

Palanga International Airport is the closest to Klaipėda, while Vilnius and Riga offer wider international connections followed by a road transfer. Port and terminal gate passes are arranged through the ship's agent, shipyard entry through Western Shipyard, and ships at anchor are reached by launch. Lithuania is in Schengen, so our team from India needs a Schengen visa before departure, and we fix dates with the docking slot early to keep the consular timeline comfortable. Winter dockings need the same lead time as summer ones.

• 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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