RULES AND REGULATIONS FOR FREEBOARD. 143 
DISCUSSION 
THe CHAIRMAN :—Gentlemen, this paper, No. 8, entitled “‘Rules and Regulations 
for Freeboard,”’ deals with a very interesting subject, and I take it all of us are of the 
opinion that some load-line legislation should be adopted in this country, but it is one 
of those delicate questions that are involved in competitive work and rates between ships 
of different nations, and therefore the particular methods advocated in any case may lead 
to a great deal of controversy. The subject is now open for discussion. 
Me. E. H. Rice, Member:—I think we are all indebted to Mr. Arnott for presenting 
to us such a full and interesting historical survey of this intricate subject. As he points 
out, our transactions do not contain much on this subject. The subject of freeboard is 
commanding a great deal of attention at the present time, for several good reasons. 
Some of these reasons may be summarized as follows: 
1. It is as impossible to design a ship without limiting draught as it is to design a 
bridge without defining the loads. In routine work this fact may be somewhat obscured 
by the use of rules which have been based on draught conditions, but which do not them- 
selves keep draught constantly before the shipbuilder. 
2. It has lately become very much the vogue to buy and sell cargo boats and oil 
tankers on a deadweight basis. Can anyone figure how to arrive at the deadweight 
carrying capacity of a vessel without a draught or freeboard standard? 
3. We are about the only great maritime power which has no freeboard standards 
established by governmental authority. Our vessels trading to the ports of countries 
having such freeboard laws are compelled to submit to such law at such port; during the 
war emergency this may not have always been rigidly enforced, but we can rest assured 
it will be now. 
4. There is a region between an unquestionably safe loading and one where serious 
structural straining can be expected. A reasonable overload on any good engineering 
structure can always be met without danger of actual collapse. This is the region where 
differences of opinion will be met and where the interests of owner, crew, builder, and 
underwriter will have to be taken care of by a judicious compromise. 
There are two further aspects of the matter to be considered, the national and the 
international; the latter is fairly clear and we now tacitly accept the present British 
regulations, which have the experience of about thirty years behind them and which 
have been accepted as a basis by several other nations. 
The British have recently prepared and published a set of revised and simplified 
freeboard rules which represent their views of a desirable international loading scale. 
When we come to the national side of the question, we find several difficulties. Any 
ship which goes to sea is subjected to the dangers of the sea, but it is generally conceded 
that the coastwise trade enjoys advantages that deep-sea ships do not; it is operating in 
waters that are nearer to harbors of refuge, though it is also true that no ship that has a 
definite run to make should be so loaded that she is only fit to dodge along from port to 
port in constant touch with the Weather Bureau. The vast bulk of the coastwise 
trade is operating at draughts well within safe limits, and such shipping should be relieved 
of the unfair competition of the few who may be tempted to overload. 
