Yachting Monthly was the first leisure boating magazine to highlight the dangers of sinking and damage from lost containers in its investigative article on the subject carried in the June 2001 issue.

The problem is not going away. Lloyd’s List has reported that fifty-eight containers were washed into the North Sea from a ship on passage from Rotterdam to Hamburg.

Nine of the boxes were washed up on the Dutch island of Terschelling where police were called in to guard beaches after sportsgear and Barbie dolls were found scattered along the coast.

The P&O Nedlloyd Mondriaan, now part of the Maersk fleet, lost the containers overboard during bad weather while many others were damaged.