SONATA
STOWAGE PLANNING AS A SERVICE
WHAT IS “STOWAGE PLANNING AS A SERVICE” (SPAAS)?
​
It is a service where carriers can outsource the stowage planning. We assist in the production of
optimized stowage plans for container vessels.
​
Experienced and trained
pool of professionals
State-of-the-art planning
software
Mature and continuous
improvement processes
These stowage plans are indexed to demonstrate the quality of each plan, with respect to optimal
stow, DG segregation, and space optimization, meeting of stability, and lashing requirements.
STAGE 1:
APPRAISAL
Once the service confirmation is received,
our team will revise your standard operating
procedures, existing processes, and the current
outcomes. The insights and understanding
gained during the appraisal will be
documented.
STAGE 2:
OPERATION PLANNING
AND DATA UPLOAD
The presentation of the finalized working
process will be planned out with your team and
documented and signed off by both teams. The
technical details for the list of vessels which
need to be planned, will be created. Such as:
​
a. Vessel profile
b. Updating the company policy (“house
rules”), DOC (Document of Compliance for
Dangerous Goods) for hazardous cargo,
banned cargo and OOG acceptance criteria
c. Updating the vessel stability data in SONATA
planning software or interfacing it with
client’s stability software (providing technical
feasibility).
d. Technical details are required to build the
vessel’s profiles, such as:
-
Hatch cover and reefer positions
-
Wet slots, walkways and heated tanks
-
Trimmed hydrostatic data
-
Tank sounding data’s FSM
-
Down flooding angles
-
Bonjean area data
​
-
Allowable shearing force, bending
moments and permissible torsional
moments -
Description of appendages
-
GM data
-
KN cross curves
-
Lightship weight distribution
-
Lashing details
-
Set of plans (General Arrangement,
Capacity Plan, Container Stowage Plan)
​
The data as received above is necessary to set
up the vessel’s profile and match the stability
results with shipyard calculations. If the client
already has this information in their stability
software, then the API / web service call will be
created between client stability software and
SONATA (stowage planning application).
STAGE 3:
STOWAGE PLANNING
CREATION
To create a stowage plan, our team needs
to receive, from the carrier, the following
information before the vessel’s call:
​
-
Vessel’s schedule with the complete port
rotation for voyages ahead-IFTSAI -
Regular forecast of the number of containers to load, equipment type, weight category and the port pair details. - in EDI format (IFTMBF, COPRAR, BAPLIE, etc., we support the use of Excel files as loading lists)
-
The departure BAPLIE files from previous
port/terminal- BAPLIE -
The COPRAR or the booking forecast / load
list will be received from the client- OPRAR -
All DG, OOG and reefer cargo list will be
received- COPRAR or Excel file -
Number of empty containers to load.
COPRAR or Excel file
With these details, our team creates an
optimized stowage plan, taking into account
the hazardous cargo segregation, and all vessel
constraints such as stability, stress, lashing
forces, required trim, minimum no of crane
moves, optimized crane split for loading and
discharging ports, etc.
​
All our stowage plans will be created and stored
in a shared folder accessed by the responsible
operations team.
STAGE 4:
MONITORING -
STOWAGE PLAN
QUALITY INDEX
This is the stage where our team along with
your operations team, will evaluate the stowage
plans and a “plan quality index” will be created.
This means each plan sent to terminals will be
evaluated and scored for various criteria’s such
as –
​
-
Maximization of loading
-
Uniformity of cargo spread
-
Minimum crane moves
-
Minimum restows
-
Clustering of hazardous cargo on board
-
Segregation of hazardous cargo cargo from
reefer plugs -
Compliance of special instructions (house
rules) -
Stability, stresses and lashing forces
A regular feedback session will be scheduled
with the carrier’s operations team, to align the
carrier’s needs and revise and improve plan as
required. This coordination is essential as this
will continually improve the quality of the plans.
HOW DOES STOWAGE PLANNING AS A SERVICE WORK?
​
The full process from the beginning to the end can be defined in 4 main stages.
SONATA SERVICES
​