Lloyd’s Register (LR) has issues a statutory alert for new IMO requirements for means of escape from machinery spaces on new passenger and cargo ships, amendments to SOLAS Regulation II-2/13.4. This is applicable to all new passenger ships with keel laid on or after Jan. 1 2016.

The amendments will require two means of escape from a machinery control room, from main workshops within the machinery space, with at least one of these escape routes providing a continuous fire shelter to a safe position outside the machinery space.

All inclined ladders and stairways fitted with open treads in machinery spaces being part of or providing access to escape routes, but not located within a protected enclosure, will have to be fitted with steel shields attached to their undersides.

For further clarification, LR referred to IMO Circular MSC. 1/Circ. 1511.