The gap the Convention closed
Before 14 April 2015 the law on hazardous wrecks was a patchwork. Inside its territorial sea a coastal State could order removal under domestic legislation, the UK Merchant Shipping Act 1995 being one example, and recover the cost from the owner if the owner could be found and was solvent. Beyond the territorial sea, in the exclusive economic zone out to 200 nautical miles, there was no general treaty right. A bulk carrier that grounded on a reef 30 nautical miles offshore and broke up there left the coastal State facing a navigational hazard, a potential pollution source, and a salvage bill, with no uniform mechanism to compel the owner to act or to bill the owner’s insurer.
The 1989 Salvage Convention did not fill the gap. Salvage rewards a salvor who acts to save property and, under the special-compensation and SCOPIC machinery, to prevent environmental damage, but it does not give the coastal State a stand-alone right to order removal of a wreck that nobody wants to salve. The owner of a constructive total loss has every incentive to abandon the hull and walk away from the removal cost, which often exceeds the residual value of the wreck many times over. The 1969 Intervention Convention let a coastal State act against an oil-pollution threat on the high seas, but it addressed intervention against a casualty, not the long tail of removing the resulting wreck.
The result was that coastal States carried the cost. The IMO Legal Committee began work on a wreck-removal instrument in the 1990s. The negotiation ran for more than a decade, the central fights being whether the regime should reach inside the territorial sea and how to anchor liability and insurance. The compromise, a default EEZ scope with an opt-in territorial extension, plus compulsory insurance and direct action borrowed from the CLC 1992 and Bunkers 2001 model, is the shape of the Convention adopted in Nairobi.
Adoption in Nairobi and entry into force
The Diplomatic Conference adopted the Convention on 18 May 2007 in Nairobi, Kenya. Entry into force under Article 18 required ratification, acceptance, approval, or accession by ten States, with the Convention taking effect twelve months after the tenth instrument was deposited. Denmark’s deposit triggered the count, and the Convention entered into force on 14 April 2015.
By the time the Convention came into force the parties already included a spread of major flag and coastal States, and the party list has grown since to capture a large share of world tonnage, including the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, France, Malta, Cyprus, Liberia, the Marshall Islands, Palau, the Cook Islands, India, Iran, Nigeria, Kenya, Morocco, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania, Antigua and Barbuda, the Republic of the Congo, and Tonga, among others, with the ratification list maintained by the IMO and the United Nations Treaty Collection. A ship flying the flag of a non-party that calls at the port of a State Party is still caught by the certificate-on-demand rule, so the practical reach runs wider than the flag-party list alone.
The Convention is short, 21 articles and one annexed certificate form, and it borrows its architecture deliberately from the pollution-liability conventions so that the same P&I cover, the same blue-card workflow, and the same direct-action habit slot into place without a new market having to be built.
What counts as a “wreck”
Article 1(4) defines “wreck” broadly. Following a maritime casualty, a wreck is one of four things: a sunken or stranded ship; any part of a sunken or stranded ship, including any object that is or has been on board such a ship; any object that is lost at sea from a ship and that is stranded, sunken, or adrift at sea; or a ship that is about to sink or to strand, or may reasonably be expected to do so, where effective measures to assist the ship or any property in danger are not already being taken.
That last limb matters in practice. It pulls a ship that has not yet sunk into the regime once it is clear the casualty will end in a wreck and nobody is salving her, which lets the affected State act before the hull settles on the seabed rather than waiting for it to break up. The reference to “any object that is or has been on board” reaches lost containers, deck cargo, and machinery that comes off the ship, so a stack of containers swept overboard in heavy weather can be a “wreck” for the purpose of the Convention even though the ship herself stays afloat.
A “maritime casualty” under Article 1(3) is a collision, stranding, or other incident of navigation, or other occurrence on board or external to a ship, resulting in material damage or an imminent threat of material damage to a ship or its cargo. The casualty is the trigger event; the wreck is the consequence the Convention regulates.
When a wreck becomes a “hazard”
Liability and the duties to locate, mark, and remove all turn on the wreck being a hazard. Article 1(5) defines “hazard” as any condition or threat that poses a danger or impediment to navigation, or that may reasonably be expected to result in major harmful consequences to the marine environment, or damage to the coastline or related interests of one or more States.
Article 6 then lists the criteria the affected State uses to decide whether a wreck is a hazard, and the list reads like a survey checklist: the type, size, and construction of the wreck; the depth of water in the area; the tidal range and currents; particularly sensitive sea areas and the proximity of shipping routes or traffic lanes; the nature and quantity of the wreck’s cargo, the amount and types of oil (bunker oil and oil cargo) on board, and the damage likely to result should the cargo or oil be released into the marine environment; and the proximity of offshore installations, pipelines, telecommunications cables, and similar structures.
The “hazard to navigation” limb and the “harm to the environment or coastline” limb are alternatives, not cumulative. A clean wreck sitting in a shipping lane in shallow water is a hazard on the navigation limb even if it carries no oil. A laden wreck leaking bunker oil onto a sensitive coastline is a hazard on the environmental limb even if it lies clear of any traffic lane. Either is enough.
The Convention area: EEZ by default, territorial sea by opt-in
Article 1(1) defines the Convention area as the exclusive economic zone of a State Party established under international law, or, if a State Party has not declared an EEZ, an area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea of that State, determined by that State under international law and extending not more than 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of its territorial sea is measured. The default reach is the band of sea from the outer edge of the territorial sea out to 200 nautical miles.
The default scope deliberately excludes the territorial sea, the belt up to 12 nautical miles from the baseline, because inside that belt a coastal State already has sovereignty and its own removal law. The negotiators left it to each State to decide whether to fold the territorial sea into the Convention regime, and Article 3(2) is the switch. A State Party may, by notification to the IMO Secretary-General at the time of expressing consent to be bound or at any time afterwards, extend the application of the Convention to wrecks located within its territory, including the territorial sea, subject to two carve-outs in Article 4(4): the consultation duty in Article 9(7) about removal methods and the proportionality duty in Article 11(2) do not apply to the territorial-sea extension because the State already has full control there.
More than twenty States have made the Article 3(2) extension, the United Kingdom (through the Wreck Removal Convention Act 2011), France, Denmark, Finland, Canada, Japan, Panama, and others among them. The practical consequence is sharp: in an extending State, a single uniform regime, compulsory insurance, direct action, the certificate, and the locate-mark-remove duties, runs without a break from the baseline out to 200 miles. In a non-extending State, a wreck inside 12 miles is governed by domestic law alone, the Convention’s compulsory-insurance regime does not reach it, and the affected State falls back on whatever recovery mechanism national legislation provides. An owner or insurer assessing exposure has to check, port by port, whether each coastal State has switched on the extension.
Strict liability of the registered owner
Article 10(1) is the liability rule: the registered owner is liable for the costs of locating, marking, and removing the wreck under Articles 7, 8, and 9 respectively, unless the owner proves that the maritime casualty that caused the wreck resulted from one of three exceptions. Those exceptions, in Article 10(1)(a) to (c), mirror the pollution conventions: an act of war, hostilities, civil war, insurrection, or a natural phenomenon of an exceptional, inevitable, and irresistible character; an act or omission done with intent to cause damage by a third party; or the negligence or other wrongful act of any Government or other authority responsible for the maintenance of lights or other navigational aids in the exercise of that function.
Liability is strict. The affected State need not prove the owner was negligent; it need only show a wreck that is a hazard and the costs reasonably incurred in dealing with it. The “registered owner” under Article 1(8) is the person registered as the owner of the ship or, in the absence of registration, the person owning the ship at the time of the maritime casualty. The WRC channels liability to the registered owner alone, narrower than the four-party “shipowner” of the Bunkers Convention 2001, which also reaches the bareboat charterer, manager, and operator. Under the WRC the bareboat charterer, manager, and operator are not primary defendants, though the State can pursue the insurer directly under Article 12(10).
The owner’s liability is for costs, the cost of locating, marking, and removing the hazard, not a general pollution-damage head. That cost framing is what distinguishes the WRC from CLC and Bunkers: those conventions compensate pollution damage and preventive measures, while the WRC reimburses the public cost of dealing with the wreck as a physical obstruction and environmental threat.
Reporting, locating, and marking duties
The Convention puts a chain of duties in motion the moment a casualty produces a wreck.
Reporting (Article 5). A State Party requires the master and operator of a ship flying its flag to report to the affected State without delay when that ship has been involved in a maritime casualty resulting in a wreck. The report must give the precise location of the wreck, its type, size, and construction, the nature of the damage, the nature and quantity of cargo (in particular hazardous and noxious substances) and oil on board, and the amount and types of oil, so the affected State can begin the hazard assessment.
Locating (Article 7). Once notified of a wreck, the affected State takes all practicable steps to establish the precise location of the wreck and to warn mariners and the States concerned by issuing the appropriate notices to mariners.
Marking (Article 8). If the affected State determines the wreck is a hazard, it ensures all reasonable steps are taken to mark the wreck. The marking conforms to the internationally accepted system of buoyage in use in the area, in practice the IALA Maritime Buoyage System and its emergency-wreck-marking buoy, and the position and particulars of the marking are promulgated by notice to mariners.
These duties sit on the affected State, but the cost is recoverable from the registered owner under Article 10, so the practical sequence is that the State acts and bills the owner (or, through direct action, the insurer).
The removal duty and proportionality
Article 9 is the core operative provision and it sets a measured sequence. When the affected State has determined the wreck is a hazard, it first notifies the registered owner and the ship’s flag State. The registered owner is then responsible for removing the wreck (Article 9(2)). The owner may contract any salvor or other person to do so, but the affected State may set conditions for the removal to the extent necessary to ensure safety and protection of the marine environment, and may intervene in the removal only to the extent consistent with the Convention (Article 9(4) and 9(5)).
The State sets a reasonable deadline for the owner to remove the wreck and informs the owner in writing of that deadline (Article 9(6)). If the owner does not remove the wreck within the deadline, or cannot be contacted, the affected State may remove the wreck itself by the most practical and expeditious means available, consistent with safety and environmental protection (Article 9(7) and 9(8)). The State may also act at once, without waiting out the deadline, where the hazard becomes particularly severe and immediate action is required (Article 9(9)).
Article 11(2) carries a proportionality discipline: measures taken by the affected State must not go beyond what is reasonably necessary to remove a wreck that constitutes a hazard, must not interfere unnecessarily with the rights and interests of other States including the flag State, and must not cause undue cost. That proportionality duty does not apply to wrecks inside the territorial sea of a State that has made the Article 3(2) extension, because there the State acts under its own sovereignty.
Limitation of liability and the LLMC link
Like the Bunkers Convention 2001, the WRC contains no Convention-specific cap. Article 10(2) reads that nothing in the Convention affects the right of the owner to limit liability under any applicable national or international regime, such as the Convention on Limitation of Liability for Maritime Claims (LLMC), 1976, as amended. The size of the limit, and even whether limitation is available at all for wreck-removal claims, depends on the forum State’s LLMC position. Owners and insurers can model the LLMC property-column figure against gross tonnage with the LLMC 1976 limitation calculator; the Nairobi WRC exposure feeds off the same tonnage bands through the companion Nairobi Wreck Removal liability calculator.
The interaction is more delicate than a simple “the LLMC limit applies.” The 1976 LLMC and its 1996 Protocol list claims in respect of the raising, removal, destruction, or rendering harmless of a sunken, wrecked, stranded, or abandoned ship in Article 2(1)(d) and (e), but Article 18(1) of the LLMC lets a State Party reserve the right to exclude those wreck-removal claims from limitation altogether. Many States, the United Kingdom among them, have made that reservation, so a wreck-removal claim in those forums is not subject to the LLMC global limit and the owner faces uncapped exposure backed by the WRC insurance. Where a State has not made the reservation, wreck-removal claims either fall within the general property column or, in States that have brought them into a separate fund, are met from a dedicated wreck-removal limitation fund.
The relevant LLMC property limits under the 1996 Protocol as amended by Resolution LEG.5(99), in force 8 June 2015, run on a sliding scale from a fixed 1,510,000 SDR for ships up to 2,000 GT, plus 604 SDR per GT from 2,001 to 30,000 GT, 453 SDR per GT from 30,001 to 70,000 GT, and 302 SDR per GT above 70,000 GT.
| Symbol | Meaning | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Limitation of Liability Maritime Claims |
Source: IMO Conventions
Calculate Limitation of Liability Mariti... →Compulsory insurance and the certificate (300 GT and above)
Article 12(1) is the financial-security engine. The registered owner of a ship of 300 gross tonnage and above, flying the flag of a State Party, must maintain insurance or other financial security, such as a guarantee of a bank or similar institution, to cover liability under the Convention in an amount equal to the limits of liability under the applicable national or international limitation regime, but in all cases not exceeding an amount calculated in accordance with the LLMC 1976 as amended.
Compliance is evidenced by a certificate issued by or under the authority of the flag State (Article 12(2)), in the form annexed to the Convention, attesting that the insurance or security is in force. The certificate is carried on board and produced on demand. The 300 GT threshold is lower than the Bunkers Convention 2001 line of 1,000 GT and lower than the CLC threshold tied to oil-cargo carriage, so the WRC certificate reaches a wider band of smaller ships, coasters, larger fishing vessels, offshore craft, and small dry-cargo ships that would not need a Bunkers certificate.
The insurance behind the certificate is, in practice, written by the International Group P&I Clubs as part of mutual entry, with the Club issuing a blue card to the flag State exactly as it does for CLC and Bunkers cover. Article 12(11) lets a State Party authorize a recognized institution to issue the certificate on the flag State’s behalf, and Article 12(12) directs States not to permit a ship entitled to fly their flag to operate without a certificate. Article 12(13) extends the requirement to any ship of 300 GT and above entering or leaving a port, or arriving at or leaving an offshore facility, in the territory of a State Party, whatever flag it flies. That port-State hook is what brings non-party-flag tonnage inside the regime: a ship cannot trade to a State Party port without the certificate or equivalent evidence of cover.
Direct action against the insurer
Article 12(10) gives the affected State a direct right of action against the insurer or other person providing financial security for the registered owner’s liability. This is the same mechanism that makes the CLC 1992 and Bunkers regimes work in practice: the claimant does not have to chase a single-ship company with no recoverable assets, it sues the P&I Club or guarantor on the certificate.
The defences available to the insurer are spelled out. The insurer may invoke the defences (other than bankruptcy or winding-up of the owner) that the registered owner would have been entitled to invoke, including the right to limit liability under Article 10(2). The insurer may also raise the defence that the loss resulted from the wilful misconduct of the owner, a defence the owner could not raise against the State. And the insurer may always require the owner to be joined to the proceedings. The “pay to be paid” rule of ordinary P&I cover, under which the Club pays only after the member has paid the claimant, does not apply to a direct-action claim under the Convention, which is what makes the certificate a genuine guarantee rather than an indemnity contingent on the owner’s solvency.
Time bars under Article 13
Article 13 sets a two-limb time bar. A claim for costs under the Convention is extinguished unless an action is brought within three years from the date the hazard has been determined by the affected State. In no case, though, may an action be brought after six years from the date of the maritime casualty that resulted in the wreck. Where the casualty consists of a series of occurrences, the six-year period runs from the date of the first occurrence.
The two limbs work together: the three-year clock fixes the window once the State has done its hazard assessment, and the six-year long-stop caps the total period from the casualty even if the hazard determination comes late. For owners and insurers the practical effect is that exposure under the Convention has a defined tail; for affected States it means the hazard determination should not be left to drift, because the three-year clock cannot rescue a claim once the six-year long-stop has run.
Relationship to CLC 1992, Bunkers 2001, and HNS 2010
The WRC does not stand alone. Article 4(3) provides that the Convention does not apply to measures taken under the International Convention Relating to Intervention on the High Seas in Cases of Oil Pollution Casualties, 1969, and, more importantly for day-to-day claims, it gives way to the pollution-liability conventions for the costs those conventions cover. The drafting bars an owner from being liable for the same cost twice, and it sets a precedence order.
Where wreck-removal or related costs are recoverable under the CLC 1992 read with the Fund Convention 1992 and, where in force, the Supplementary Fund Protocol 2003, those instruments govern. CLC defines “preventive measures” to include the cost of removing or neutralizing a laden oil-tanker wreck to prevent or minimize pollution damage, so for a laden tanker the oil-pollution regime, with its layered IOPC Fund compensation, generally captures the removal cost and the WRC does not apply to that head.
Where the relevant ship is a non-tanker and the cost relates to bunker-oil pollution, the Bunkers Convention 2001 governs that pollution cost. Where the cost relates to hazardous and noxious substances carried as cargo, the HNS Convention 2010 governs once it is in force. In each case the pollution convention takes precedence for the cost it covers, and the WRC fills the remaining gap: the cost of removing the wreck as a navigational hazard, and the cost of dealing with a wreck whose hazard is to navigation or the environment but that does not fall within a pollution convention’s compensable heads.
The clean dividing line is the nature of the cost, not the type of ship. Pollution-prevention and pollution-damage costs flow into CLC, the Fund, Bunkers, or HNS. Pure wreck-removal cost, raising, marking, removing a hazard, flows into the Nairobi WRC. A single casualty can engage several regimes at once: a laden tanker wreck might sit under CLC and the Fund for the oil-pollution cost while the Nairobi WRC reaches any residual navigational-hazard removal cost not compensable as a preventive measure. Practitioners reconcile these at the claim-allocation stage, and the OPRC 1990 and HNS Protocol preparedness framework sits behind all of them on the operational side.
Operational compliance for owners and managers
For the owner of a ship of 300 GT and above the Convention is an absorbed part of the trading-certificate set, alongside the IOPP, CLC (for tankers), Bunkers, and ISM/ISPS documents. The compliance baseline is uninterrupted P&I entry, prompt issue and renewal of the WRC blue card and the flag-State certificate, and onboard carriage of the certificate for production to port-State control. Paris and Tokyo MOU port-State control verifies the certificate on inspection, and an expired or missing certificate is a detainable item.
The risk picture for the owner has two layers. The first is the certificate face value, which tracks the LLMC tonnage band and is met by P&I cover. The second is the uncapped exposure in any forum that has excluded wreck-removal claims from LLMC limitation by an Article 18 reservation, the United Kingdom being the leading example. In those waters the owner’s exposure is the actual reasonable cost of removal, which for a large grounded vessel in a difficult location can run into the tens or hundreds of millions, well above the LLMC property limit. P&I cover for wreck removal is provided as a standard rule of entry, but owners should confirm the cover and its sub-limits against the worst-case removal scenario in the trading area, not against the certificate face value alone.
Where the wreck threatens a particularly sensitive sea area or a sensitive coastline, the hazard determination is more likely and the State is more likely to act quickly under Article 9(9), so the SOPEP and the operator’s casualty-response plan, the same plans that drive the Annex I Regulation 37 SOPEP duty, double as the practical interface with the WRC reporting duty under Article 5. An owner whose master reports promptly and whose bunker-tank protection under Regulation 12A reduces the oil released after a grounding faces both a lower pollution cost and a lower wreck-removal cost.
Casualties that shaped the regime and the post-2015 record
The push for a wreck-removal treaty drew on a long record of expensive abandoned wrecks. The Tricolor, a car carrier that sank in the Dover Strait in December 2002 carrying around 2,900 vehicles, sat in one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world and was struck by two other ships before it could be marked and removed; the removal ran in pieces over much of 2003 and cost on the order of tens of millions of euros, with the cost falling on the salvors, insurers, and the coastal States rather than on a clean treaty mechanism. The Dover Strait casualty is the textbook example of a navigational-hazard wreck in a non-territorial-sea position that the WRC was written to catch.
Since entry into force on 14 April 2015 the Convention has been the working frame for hazardous-wreck claims in party States, and the certificate has joined the standard trading set without friction because the P&I market already issued CLC and Bunkers blue cards on the same workflow. The volume of WRC certificates issued runs to the bulk of the world fleet of 300 GT and above, because the port-State hook in Article 12(13) forces non-party-flag ships to carry the certificate or equivalent security to trade to party ports. The practical test of the regime is not the headline grounding but the steady stream of smaller casualties, coasters and fishing vessels in the 300 to 3,000 GT band, where the certificate gives the affected State a solvent target it did not have before 2015.
The Costa Concordia, which capsized off Giglio in January 2012, predated entry into force and lay inside Italian territorial waters, so it was handled under Italian law rather than the Convention, but its removal, the largest maritime salvage in history at a reported cost above 1.5 billion US dollars, is the reference point for what a worst-case wreck-removal exposure can reach. It is also a reminder that the Convention’s default EEZ scope would not have caught it: only the Article 3(2) territorial-sea extension brings an inshore wreck inside the regime, and Italy’s position on the extension governs whether a comparable future casualty inshore would be a Convention claim.
Worked exposure example
Take a 25,000 GT general-cargo ship flagged to a State Party that grounds and becomes a total loss 40 nautical miles offshore in the EEZ of a coastal State Party. The wreck blocks an approach used by feeder traffic and leaks bunker oil onto a sensitive coast, so the affected State determines it a hazard on both limbs of Article 1(5).
On the certificate side, the registered owner’s WRC certificate must cover liability up to the applicable LLMC limit. The LLMC 1996 property column for 25,000 GT is 1,510,000 SDR plus 604 SDR for each GT from 2,001 to 25,000, that is 604 multiplied by 22,999, about 13.89 million SDR, for a total near 15.4 million SDR, roughly 20 to 21 million US dollars at a long-run SDR rate around 1.34. That figure sizes the certificate and the blue card.
On the exposure side, the analysis splits by forum. If the affected State has not excluded wreck-removal claims from LLMC limitation, the owner can limit removal-cost liability to the property-column figure, and the certificate cover meets it. If the affected State has made the Article 18 LLMC reservation (as the United Kingdom has), wreck-removal claims are outside limitation and the owner faces the actual reasonable cost of removal, which for a 25,000 GT wreck in a difficult position can run well past 30 to 50 million US dollars, above the certificate face value. The bunker-oil pollution cost is a separate head handled under the Bunkers Convention 2001, and any cargo-related HNS cost would fall under the HNS Convention 2010 once in force, so the WRC claim is for the removal cost alone, net of what those pollution regimes capture. The lesson for the owner is to size P&I wreck-removal cover against the worst-case removal scenario in the trading area, not against the certificate’s LLMC face value.
The certificate workflow and port-State control
The certificate workflow mirrors the CLC and Bunkers pattern. The owner enters the ship in an International Group P&I Club; the Club issues a WRC blue card to the flag State certifying wreck-removal cover to the LLMC limit; the flag State, or a recognized organization authorized under Article 12(11), issues the WRC certificate in the annexed form, valid for the policy year and renewed annually; and on Club withdrawal, mid-year sale, or change of flag the Club withdraws the blue card and the flag State withdraws the certificate. The same blue card a member relies on for hull-and-machinery and liability cover underpins the wreck-removal certificate, so the administrative burden on the owner is marginal.
Flag-state and port-state enforcement closes the loop. Article 12(12) directs each State Party not to permit a ship entitled to fly its flag to operate without a certificate, and Article 12(13) requires any ship of 300 GT and above to carry the certificate to enter or leave a party-State port or offshore facility whatever its flag. Port-State control under the Paris and Tokyo MOUs verifies the certificate at initial inspection, and a missing or expired certificate is a detainable deficiency on a par with a missing IOPP or Bunkers certificate. That enforcement layer is what gives the direct-action right its teeth: a ship without valid cover cannot trade to a party port, so the certificate, and the solvent insurer behind it, is in practice always in place when a casualty happens.
Limitations and practitioner notes
This article states the Nairobi WRC as adopted in 2007 and in force since 14 April 2015, and the LLMC 1996 Protocol as amended by Resolution LEG.5(99). Several caveats matter for advice.
Territorial-sea coverage is forum-specific. The Convention reaches inside the territorial sea only where the coastal State has made the Article 3(2) extension. Whether a given wreck inside 12 miles is caught by the Convention, including the compulsory-insurance and direct-action regime, depends entirely on whether that State has switched on the extension. Check the State’s Article 3(2) notification before assuming the regime applies inshore.
Limitation is forum-specific and may not apply at all. Article 10(2) defers to the LLMC, but Article 18 of the LLMC lets a State exclude wreck-removal claims from limitation. In the United Kingdom and other reserving States, wreck-removal liability is uncapped. The certificate face value tracks the LLMC band, but the actual exposure can break through it. Never advise on a wreck-removal limit without checking the forum State’s LLMC ratification and any Article 18 reservation.
The Convention reimburses cost, not pollution damage. The WRC covers the cost of locating, marking, and removing a hazardous wreck. It is not a compensation regime for pollution damage, economic loss to fisheries and tourism, or property damage. Those heads, where they arise, sit under CLC, the Fund, Bunkers, or HNS, and an affected State recovering under the WRC for removal cost may still have to pursue the pollution conventions for the damage cost.
Precedence with the pollution conventions cuts both ways. Article 4(3) gives way to the pollution conventions for the costs they cover, which avoids double recovery but also means a State cannot use the WRC to recover a cost that is, in law, a CLC preventive measure or a Bunkers pollution cost. The allocation between regimes for a single casualty is a live area of dispute, particularly the boundary between a CLC “preventive measure” and a WRC “removal” cost for a laden tanker wreck.
Non-party exposure runs through the port hook. A ship flying a non-party flag is not directly bound by the flag-State certificate duty, but Article 12(13) bars it from a State Party port without the certificate or equivalent security. The United States is not a party to the WRC and addresses wreck removal under domestic law, so a casualty in US waters is outside the Convention entirely.
“Reasonable” is the contested word. Article 11 limits the State to measures reasonably necessary and proportionate, and Article 9 requires a reasonable deadline. What is reasonable, both in the choice of removal method and in the cost claimed, is the most litigated question in WRC practice. An owner challenging a State’s claim usually does so on proportionality and on whether the cost was reasonably incurred, not on the existence of liability.
See also
- Nairobi Wreck Removal liability calculator
- LLMC 1976 limitation of liability calculator
- CLC 1992: civil liability for oil pollution damage
- Bunkers Convention 2001: civil liability for bunker oil
- HNS Convention 2010: hazardous and noxious substances liability
- Fund Convention 1992: International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund
- Supplementary Fund Protocol 2003
- LLMC 1976/1996/2012: limitation of liability for maritime claims
- Salvage Convention 1989 and SCOPIC
- Towage and salvage operations
- OPRC 1990 and the HNS Protocol