OOCL - OOCL Reaps Four Gold Awards from the HKO

OOCL Reaps Four Gold Awards from the HKO

On June 8, 2012, OOCL was presented with four Hong Kong Voluntary Observing Ship Awards by the Hong Kong Observatory (HKO) to recognize our vessel’s important contributions to providing marine climatological data needed to help identify prevailing weather conditions for preparing forecasts and warnings to the maritime community.

Our vessels OOCL Brisbane, OOCL Hamburg, OOCL Rotterdam, and OOCL Tokyo reaped the majority of four out of five Gold Awards for having each submitted more than 300 climatological reports to the HKO last year. These submissions contribute to improving the use of weather information in the marine sector to help safeguard navigation safety, particularly in times of severe weather conditions.

Hong Kong is susceptible to the threat of tropical cyclones due to its geographic location. The intensity of a tropical cyclone is determined by the strength of the surface winds near its centre and climatological reports from vessels in the area are very useful as they provide surface wind speed observations which are directly related to the intensity of the tropical cyclone.

According to the HKO, a total of 56 vessels have been registered as the Hong Kong Voluntary Observing Ships and among them OOCL is a big supporter of this program with 32 participating vessels. We have been participating in this program since 1989, with OOCL Exporter being the first vessel we registered with the HKO as a voluntary observing ship equipped with the meteorological instruments.

The HKO is one of the eight centers in the world designated by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) to collect marine meteorological data and to compile marine climatological summaries. The area of responsibility of Hong Kong is the South China Sea from the Equator to 30N and from 100E to 120E.

As a Hong Kong-based company, joining the Hong Kong Voluntary Observing Ships program is a part of OOCL’s commitment to contributing back to the community. We hope our participation in this program will continue to strengthen the climatological work of the HKO in providing weather forecast and warnings that would benefit the maritime community at large.

OOCL is recognized through our vessels OOCL Brisbane, OOCL Hamburg, OOCL Rotterdam, and OOCL Tokyo for being outstanding Hong Kong Voluntary Observing Ships in providing helpful climatological data to the Hong Kong Observatory towards weather forecast and warnings.

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