General average declared for Ever Forward after unsuccesful attempts to refloat

&quot;The law of general average is a principle of maritime law whereby all stakeholders in a sea venture proportionately share any losses resulting from a voluntary sacrifice of part of the ship or cargo to save the whole in an emergency. For instance, should the crew jettison some cargo overboard to lighten the ship in a storm, the loss would be shared pro rata by both the carrier and the cargo-owners.&quot;<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;General_average" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;General_average</a>

Does anyone have a reputable resource for how General Average actually works under today&#x27;s international law?<p>Some questions I&#x27;m curious about are:<p>(1) What constitutes an &quot;emergency&quot;? If the ship is stuck but not otherwise in imminent danger, would GA apply? It would appear to me that Evergreen <i>could</i> safely transport the cargo off the ship, but would rather just throw it overboard to save time and effort. Doesn&#x27;t that just unnecessarily pass the costs on to cargo-owners?<p>(2) Many places refer to the idea that GA only applies if jettisoning cargo actually saves the ship. It sounds like the ship is <i>really</i> stuck - if they jettison cargo but the ship still doesn&#x27;t budge, would that nullify GA?<p>(3) Is the GA liability limited by the declared value of your own cargo on that ship? What happens if the total declared value of the &quot;saved&quot; cargo is less than the value of the &quot;discarded&quot; cargo?<p>(4) Do cargo-owners have an option to say &quot;you know what, I don&#x27;t really want my cargo anymore&quot; and avoid paying GA?<p>(5) What country would have jurisdiction over any litigation in this instance? Would it be the country whose territorial waters this happened in, the flag country of the ship, the country of ownership of the ship, contract-defined, etc?

If I am understanding this correctly -- if I ship cargo across oceans via container, I am potentially accepting some piece of liability for fixing any accident that occurs? Is this true?<p>Or are they just saying, oopsie, your costs are your own costs due to this lost cargo, we will not recompensate.

The <i>Odd Lots</i> podcast did an episode on this ship—partly motivated by the fact that one of the co-host&#x27;s (Tracy Alloway) recently moved from Hong Kong to New York and all her stuff is on it:<p>&gt; <i>It&#x27;s happened again. Another container ship owned by the Evergreen Maritime Corp. has gotten stuck a year after the Ever Given became lodged in the Suez Canal and briefly halted the flow of global trade. This time the grounding happened in the Chesapeake Bay and involves the Ever Forward -- a 1000-foot container ship which happens to be carrying the contents of Tracy&#x27;s entire Hong Kong apartment. On this episode of Odd Lots, Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal speak with maritime historian Sal Mercogliano about why another ship has gotten stuck, what it says about shipping and infrastructure, and how long Tracy might have to wait to get her stuff.</i><p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;play.acast.com&#x2F;s&#x2F;oddlots&#x2F;5abecebe-aa98-11ec-9133-1f4d26396eb5" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;play.acast.com&#x2F;s&#x2F;oddlots&#x2F;5abecebe-aa98-11ec-9133-1f4...</a><p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;podcasts.apple.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;podcast&#x2F;why-tracys-furniture-is-stuck-on-a-grounded-ship&#x2F;id1056200096?i=1000554971002" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;podcasts.apple.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;podcast&#x2F;why-tracys-furniture-i...</a><p><i>Odd Lots</i> has done a number of episode on logistics over the last little while (ports (multiple times), rail, trucking, the Suez Canal and <i>Ever Given</i>, shipping pallets, shipping containers, etc), so this is just continuing the &#x27;series&#x27; in a way.

Evergreen Marine? Isn&#x27;t this the same company that ran aground in the suez canal? What gives? How would they not prevent this from happening so close to that last huge nightmare, and bottleneck in global shipping?

Battleship USS Missouri also ran aground in Chesapeake Bay in 1950.<p><i>the battleship remained stuck for over two weeks before being freed from the sand. The ship was so damaged that she had to return to port and enter dry dock for repairs.</i><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;1950_USS_Missouri_grounding" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;1950_USS_Missouri_grounding</a>

Do NOT let one of this company&#x27;s ships into the Panama Canal...

I am really surprised that it is still stuck. The Ever Given was only stuck for 6 days in what appeared to be a more challenging situation.<p>This has now been 2 weeks. I guess that since it&#x27;s not blocking anything they don&#x27;t have to move as quickly.

Remember folks these ships approach the size of the tallest skyscrapers in the country. Inertia is a bitch.

I would like to see General Average be used for more than just shipping.<p>For example, I would happily insure my house with a &#x27;General Average&#x27; based insurance. I would pay no premium upfront for said insurance, but I would be committing to pay a proportional share of anyone&#x27;s house that is part of the scheme that gets damaged.<p>Sadly nothing like this seems to exist. Instead we&#x27;re stuck with regular insurance which on average spends more on admin and overheads than it actually pays out!

One I can believe, two is stretching it, but three in a row? Something stinks.

So for anyone curious, the article mentions very briefly that there was a pilot onboard. A pilot is someone who comes onboard to help the ship navigate, and is usually required in areas like this (areas with shallow waters, etc). Transiting the Suez also requires a pilot come onboard. They come on to prevent these issues.