October 18, 2011
Maersk Line has recently experienced incidents with 4 of our reefer containers, which potentially have a contaminated gas system. 3 of the reefer units have had explosions that have resulted in 3 fatalities.

From what we know at this stage a gas has been used in the cooling system, which potentially can cause damage when the container is on power. This is currently being investigated by our own technicians as well as the unit manufacturers and external specialists.

We have not been able to identify the exact cause of the incidents, but we have noted that the units involved have had a gas repair in Vietnam between late March and late April. While it is still too early to conclude, we suspect that during these repairs the gas system may have been contaminated and that this contamination could cause the issues we have seen. Should you have had repair or maintenance carried out in Vietnam in the same period, you may wish to take precautionary measures and technical investigations.

In order to curb the risk, we are in the process of grounding approximately 800 reefers while we conduct thorough technical investigations to determine the exact cause of the issue. The conclusions of these we will use to develop a repair method if needed for the units and then get the containers back in flow.
Once the containers have been grounded it is of the utmost importance that no repairs are attempted, parts cannot be removed, and they may not be plugged in until a thorough technical investigation has taken place. We further recommend that they are stored in an isolated place and if at all possible to store them with the units facing each other, thereby preventing unauthorized personnel in tampering with them.