The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) has released its preliminary annual casualties and incidents report for 2020, which has found a reduction of 18% in the total number of casualties compared with 2019.
This is an incredibly positive finding given the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the shipping industry.
In 2020, there was a total of 2,632 incidents and 36 fatalities. A total of seven vessels were lost with five of them being fishing vessels.
The most positive finding was the reduction in the number of lives lost by 48% and the number of injured persons dropped by 36% compared with 2019. The number of pollution incidents resulting from marine casualties has also continued to decrease in 2020 with an overall reduction of 68% since 2014.
