Questions relating to responsibility, authority and contractual issues can be complicating factors when damage occurs whilst a vessel is at a repair yard or in
dry dock. The questions are mostly related to who is responsible for the damage occurring and the resulting
repair costs. Is it the vessel’s owners or the yard?

In some cases, owners have not even been aware that the yard has limited its liability in the contract.

The purpose of this circular is to address the importance of clearly allocating responsibility in the contract with the yard/dry dock for any damage caused during the docking
operation. The circular also highlights the importance of ensuring that both parties have a common understanding of what was agreed in the contract.

Planning and preparations to be undertaken prior to docking

Much of the dispute related to the case described above could have been avoided with good planning and preparations focusing on the critical steps and tasks in the docking
process.

Source : Gard AS

For more info download attachment

Infomarine On-Line Technical Library

File	Description	File size
Drydocking responsibilities and contractual issues.pdf	Planning and preparations to be undertaken prior to docking	43 Kb