Ship Hull and Tank Gauging at the Port of Milazzo

Inspection services for ships at Milazzo

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

Where ships can be gauged in and around Milazzo

Milazzo itself is not a docking port for large ships. There is no large drydock in the harbour, so a ship whose gauging points to steel renewal is normally sent to a yard elsewhere, with Messina close by along the coast and other Sicilian and mainland yards further afield. What Milazzo does offer is access: refinery quays where tankers lie alongside, passenger berths where ferries rest between rotations, and an open roadstead for ships waiting to berth.

Realistic gauging here is therefore afloat. On a tanker that means ballast tanks, the main deck and cargo piping once spaces are gas-free and entry permits are issued, usually timed around discharge or a wait at anchor. On a ferry it means vehicle decks, ramps, void spaces and any tanks the crew can clear. Readings taken in Milazzo make a sound pre-docking dataset, so the steel estimate agreed with the repair yard rests on measured thickness rather than on the figures from the previous survey.

• Refinery tanker berths: ballast tanks, deck plating and cargo piping of product tankers, scheduled with the terminal and the master
• Town harbour passenger quays: vehicle decks, ramps and void spaces of ferries and fast craft between rotations
• Milazzo roadstead: ships waiting for a berth, reached by launch in settled weather
• Lay-by berths used by coasters and small cargo ships during idle periods or after discharge
• Messina, along the coast: the nearest repair facilities for ships whose readings call for steel renewal in a docking

Port state control, regulation and the refinery trade at Milazzo

Port state control at Milazzo is carried out by the Italian Coast Guard (Guardia Costiera), working through the harbour master (Capitaneria di Porto), under the Paris MoU system. Tankers calling at a refinery are a standard inspection target, and structural findings on ageing product tankers can lead to detention, which makes an independent set of thickness readings more useful before a visit than after one. Ferries on scheduled island routes also fall under the EU rules for passenger ships in regular service.

Other regulation shapes the work. Ships calling at EU ports must carry an Inventory of Hazardous Materials with a statement of compliance under the EU Ship Recycling Regulation, and a docking is a convenient moment to bring it up to date. EU ETS and FuelEU Maritime add a carbon accounting layer for larger ships, which makes owners of older tonnage more careful about whether a refit is worth doing. Tankers and ferries fitted with scrubbers also need their wash-water and overboard piping checked as running hours accumulate.

Since 1 May 2025 the whole Mediterranean has been a sulphur emission control area, so ships calling at Milazzo burn 0.10% sulphur fuel or run a scrubber. Scrubber wash-water piping, the overboard discharge and the hull penetration around it corrode quickly in service and are worth adding to the gauging scope at every docking.

How a thickness measurement job runs at Milazzo

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

Catania airport is the usual arrival point for the crew, with a road transfer along the Sicilian coast to Milazzo. The team travels from India on Schengen visas, so dates are fixed once the visa lead time is known. Port access and ISPS passes go through the ship's agent, and refinery berths add a safety induction at the terminal gate before equipment is brought aboard.

• 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.

Related