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Existing vessels transitioning to modern safety equipment standards

Wednesday 20 December 2017
From 1 January 2018 owners of Class 1, 2, 3 and 4 domestic commercial vessels that are 'existing vessels' will start upgrading to contemporary safety equipment standards, as outlined in the National Standard for Commercial Vessels (NSCV).
Domestic vessel on a a lake facing towards you

These changes do not apply to non-survey vessels that have been required to comply with the Part G equipment requirements since 1 July 2016.

This also applies to existing non-survey vessels under Exemption 02-application for approval of a non-survey vessel. These changes support our commitment to gradually apply modern safety equipment standards to pre-National System vessels.

The new arrangements have been implemented through changes to the following standards:

To minimise costs for operators, most safety equipment can meet the NSCV requirements 'on replacement' or over a period of 1 to 5 years. In addition, some requirements only apply 'on replacement'-such as a lifejacket type and standard. Other requirements do not apply at all-such as some water illumination requirements, which could mean significant costs for little benefit.

Other changes include:

  • a number of existing generic equivalent solutions have been included in the safety equipment standard (NSCV Part C7A)
  • an error in regards to lifejacket requirements for houseboats in the leisure craft standard (NSCV Part F2) has been corrected.

For more information:

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