An assessment model of safety factors for product tankers in coastal shipping

The purpose of this paper is to assess the safety factors (SFs) of product tankers in coastal shipping. Based on the operational features and relevant literature, the safety factors of product tankers in coastal shipping were examined. A Safety Management Index (SMI) based on fuzzy AHP model was then proposed to assess those SFs, by which tanker carriers may make policies to improve the safety performance of product tankers. Finally, to validate the proposed model, the fleet of product tankers of Chinese Petroleum Corporation (CPC) in Taiwan was empirically investigated. The results proposed 16 SFs for product tankers in coastal shipping, in which, the SFs in need of improvement for CPC's fleet are: safety climate onboard the ship, crew self-regulation, crew safety knowledge, safety drill onboard the ship and the condition of ship's machinery. Based on the results, the theoretical and managerial implications for tanker carriers in improving ship safety are discussed.