PART 1 | 1. This Act is the Merchant Shipping (Wreck Removal) Act 2017. |
2. In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires —| “affected State” means the State in whose Convention area the wreck is located; |
| “Authority” means the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore established under the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore Act 1996; |
| “Convention” means the Nairobi International Convention on the Removal of Wrecks, 2007, the text of which is in the First Schedule; |
| “Convention area” means the exclusive economic zone of a State Party, established in accordance with international law or, if a State Party has not established such a zone, an area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea of that State determined by that State in accordance with international law and extending not more than 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of its territorial sea is measured; |
| “court”, in relation to any proceedings, includes any court having jurisdiction in the matter to which the proceedings relate; |
| “Director” means the Director of Marine appointed under section 4 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1995 and includes the Deputy Director of Marine appointed under that section; |
| “gross tonnage”, in relation to a ship, means its gross tonnage calculated in accordance with the regulations in Annex 1 of the International Convention on Tonnage Measurement of Ships, 1969 and any amendment to it which has come into force and has been accepted by the Government, or any successor convention accepted by the Government; |
“hazard” means any condition or threat that —| (a) | poses a danger or impediment to navigation; or | | (b) | may reasonably be expected to result in major harmful consequences to the marine environment, or damage to the coastline or related interests of one or more States; |
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| “International Safety Management Code” means the International Management Code for the Safe Operation of Ships and for Pollution Prevention 2002 adopted by the International Maritime Organization, and any amendment to it which has come into force and has been accepted by the Government; |
| “maritime casualty” means a collision of ships, stranding or other incident of navigation, or other occurrence on board a ship or external to it, resulting in material damage or imminent threat of material damage to a ship or its cargo; |
| “master”, in relation to a ship, includes every person, except a pilot, having command or charge of the ship; |
“operator”, in relation to a ship, means —| (a) | the owner of the ship; or | | (b) | any other organisation or person such as the manager, or the bareboat charterer, who has assumed the responsibility for operation of the ship from the owner of the ship and who, on assuming such responsibility, has agreed to take over all duties and responsibilities established under the International Safety Management Code; |
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| “owner”, in relation to a ship, means the owner, and includes the registered owner; |
| “port”, in relation to Singapore, has the meaning given by the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore Act 1996; |
“registered owner”, in relation to a ship, means —| (a) | the person registered as the owner of the ship; or | | (b) | in the absence of registration, the person owning the ship, |
| except that, in relation to a ship owned by a State which is operated by a person registered in that State as the ship’s operator, it means the person registered as its operator; |
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“related interests” means the interests of a coastal State directly affected or threatened by a wreck, such as —| (a) | maritime coastal, port and estuarine activities, including fisheries activities, constituting an essential means of livelihood of the persons concerned; | | (b) | tourist attractions and other economic interests of the area concerned; | | (c) | the health of the coastal population and the wellbeing of the area concerned, including conservation of marine living resources and of wildlife; and | | (d) | offshore and underwater infrastructure; |
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| “removal” means any form of prevention, mitigation or elimination of the hazard created by a wreck; |
| “ship” means a seagoing vessel of any type whatsoever, and includes hydrofoil boats, air‑cushion vehicles, submersibles, floating craft and floating platforms, except when those platforms are on location engaged in the exploration, exploitation or production of seabed mineral resources; |
“Singapore ship” means a ship —| (a) | that is registered, provisionally or otherwise, under Part 2 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1995; and | | (b) | which registry is not closed or deemed to be closed or suspended under that Part; |
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| “Singapore’s Convention area” means the exclusive economic zone of Singapore; |
| “State Party” means a State in respect of which the Convention is in force; |
“wreck”, following upon a maritime casualty, means —| (a) | a sunken or stranded ship; | | (b) | any part of a sunken or stranded ship, including any object that is or has been on board such a ship; | | (c) | any object that is lost at sea from a ship and that is stranded, sunken or adrift at sea; or | | (d) | a ship that is about, or may reasonably be expected, to sink or to strand, where effective measures to assist the ship or any property in danger are not already being taken. |
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| 3. Nothing in this Act applies in relation to any wreck following upon a maritime casualty occurring before 8 September 2017. |
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