Published 29 February 2016
The Common Marine Inspection Document (CMID) will be coming under the spotlight at a meeting of the South America Section Meeting of the International Marine Contractors Association (IMCA) in Macaé in Brazil on the afternoon of Wednesday 9 March. And, that is not all, Eduardo Gritti, of the Instituo de Ciências Náuticas (Institute of Nautical Sciences) will be delivering a presentation his organisation’s training centre.
The two presentations take place at the Comfort Suites Macaé after a networking lunch for members, and non-members interested in finding out more about the work of IMCA; and sessions bringing all at the event up to date on IMCA activities. First there will be a general update on the work of the association, which is dedicated to improving performance in the marine contracting industry, and then reports on both IMCA’s core activities (Competence & Training; and Safety, Environment & Legislation), and on the activities of the four IMCA technical divisions – Diving, Marine, Offshore Survey, and Remote Systems and ROV.
CMID provides a standard format for the inspection of offshore vessels. Its use helps promote safety and efficiency and it can help reduce the number of repeat inspections on individual marine vessels. Inspections are undertaken in liaison with the vessel owner preferably by an IIMS (International Institute of Marine Surveying) accredited vessel inspector (AVI). As a ‘living’ document, the CMID may be kept and updated on board a vessel, thus reducing the time involved in an audit. The e-CMID database is a secure method for AVIs to complete and upload their reports into a protected server, so all concerned can be confident that vessel data is kept safely and controlled by the vessel operator. Apart from the client commissioning the report, vessel CMID reports only go to those the vessel operator wishes the information to go to.
“We launched the global AVI scheme 11 months ago working with IIMS, and it is just nine months since potential AVIs could register their interest in accreditation,” explains Chris Baldwin, Technical Adviser at IMCA.”I am looking forward to bringing members and guests up-to-date about CMID (version 9 was published last year); and the AVI scheme at the Section Meeting. The scheme, and its training programme, is living up to our expectations, and already altering the vessel inspection expectations of stakeholders.”
“On average there are 20 new AVIs joining each month, and we are very close to reaching 200 applications with 165 AVIs now enrolled. I am delighted that some 30% of them have either already attended one of the CMID Accreditation courses (obligatory within a two-year period), or are booked on one, a sign of their commitment to the scheme. This year we have already held courses in Aberdeen, Abu Dhabi, Houston and Amsterdam; and others will follow in Bergen, Singapore and Southampton between now and June, with more to follow.”
There is information on the scheme, IMCA, IIMS, its subsidiary the Marine Surveying Academy (MSA), CMID, and on the CMID Accreditation Scheme with a link to AVI registration at http://www.imca-int.com/cmid. Those interested in attending the section meeting should email [email protected]