Technical Notices

The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) has confirmed that a new EU-backed information system called THETIS-Med, aimed at facilitating data sharing for port state control inspections among Mediterranean countries, has now gone live.

It will support the members of the Mediterranean Memorandum of Understanding (Med MoU) on Port State Control (PSC). It marks the beginning of a new era on how ships are targeted for inspection in the Mediterranean region, how these inspections are recorded, and how the results are made available for the exchange of information between EU and non-EU countries which are members of the Med MoU.

In the framework of the EU-funded Safemed IV project, the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) was tasked to develop such a system. The THETIS-Med system will support Algeria, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Morocco, Tunisia, and Turkey, in the execution of their obligations with respect to PSC inspections.

THETIS-Med will be expected to handle thousands of inspections each year, combining port notification information with ship particulars and inspection details in near real-time, including a target factor for each ship in port and updates on their performance.

The system will also provide PSC Officers with a direct link to RuleCheck, a decision support tool developed by EMSA that contains a repository of international and EU maritime legislation.