The question of determining whether a certain port was “safe” for a particular ship, under a specified charter-party, at a particular time and under the circumstances then prevailing, can be one of the most difficult and thought-provoking problems that a panel of arbitrators can be called upon to decide. What is a safe port? For what type of ship is it safe? When and under what conditions is it safe? One port may be safe for smaller vessels, but not for larger ones. A port ordinarily acknowledged as safe may be unsafe at a particular time, perhaps if a violent hurricane is known to be bearing directly down upon it.

The above questions equally apply to the matter of a safe berth, a warranty frequently included in the same charter which specifies that a safe port is to be designated.

Since the end of the 1939-45 world war, great changes have been taking place in ports throughout the world. There have been improvements and modernizations, some caused by greater mechanization, some by the fact that the size of the average vessel has greatly increased. There are still coasters and other specialized craft, of course, but most ships encountered are well beyond the war-time “Liberty ship” in size, as well as in speed and other particulars. And, of course, there is an ever increasing number of “monsters” — particularly tankers — which can carry 15 or more times as much cargo as a respectable size vessel of not too many years ago. In addition, new ports are frequently appearing on stretches of coast where there was no trace of a major port not too many years ago.

Nowadays, a “port” can be many different things. It can range all the way from an elaborate dock complex well up a sheltered harbour or estuary, to a spindly appearing structure extending offshore to deeper water with the cargo carried to and fro by conveyor belt or pipeline, to a large monobuoy for tankers well offshore and connected by a submarine pipeline, even to an open roadstead such as some mahogany ports where the question of “surf days” is usually covered in the charter-party.

Some attempts at definition would appear to be in order at this point. “Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary” gives the following:

“PORT — A place to which vessels may report for purposes of commerce, especially to discharge or receive their cargoes. In this sense, the word varies in its significance with the context. It normally