As Chief Mate planning to load dangerous goods on a container vessel, your examiner asks: "What precautions and checks do you go through before accepting and stowing this cargo?"

A. Confirm the vessel's Document of Compliance for the Carriage of Dangerous Goods is valid for the relevant class; check the shipper's Dangerous Goods Declaration against the booking; verify the Container Packing Certificate; confirm segregation requirements against the proposed stowage plan using the IMDG segregation table; check the Cargo Securing Manual for the approved lashing arrangement for that container weight/position; and confirm marking, labelling and placarding match the declared class before the container is loaded.

B. It is sufficient to check that the container is correctly placarded externally; no cross-check against the ship's Document of Compliance or Cargo Securing Manual is required.

C. The Cargo Securing Manual is only relevant to break-bulk and heavy-lift cargo and has no application to containerised dangerous goods.

D. Stowage planning for DG containers is purely a terminal/stevedore responsibility; the Chief Mate's role begins only after loading is complete.

A. It is issued by the flag state (or RO on its behalf) under SOLAS Chapter II-2 Regulation 19, confirming the vessel's construction, equipment and arrangements meet the requirements for carrying the specified classes of dangerous goods; if the vessel does not hold the DOC for a given class, it must not load that class of dangerous goods, regardless of commercial pressure to accept the booking.

B. The Document of Compliance is a commercial certificate issued by the cargo insurer, unrelated to SOLAS.

C. Any vessel may carry any class of dangerous goods provided the master personally authorises it in the deck log, with no separate certificate needed.

D. The Document of Compliance is required only for tankers; container and general cargo vessels carrying packaged DG have no equivalent certificate.

A. Apply sound engineering principles using the Cargo Securing Manual's general guidance and the "right-hand rule" approach to lashing geometry/load paths, ensuring the securing arrangement accounts for the vessel's actual motions (roll, pitch, heave) for the intended route/season, and document the arrangement and the reasoning used — since non-standardised cargo by definition will not have an exact pre-approved diagram in the CSM.

B. If the exact configuration is not in the Cargo Securing Manual, the cargo cannot be lashed and must not be loaded under any circumstances.

C. Use the IMDG segregation table to determine lashing arrangements, since lashing and segregation are governed by the same table.

D. Lashing arrangements for non-standard cargo are entirely at the stevedore's discretion with no input or oversight required from ship's staff.