AirFoam and Its Purpose
Airfoam is a kind of foam that we use for our innovation project, and we use it to fill in any kind of shipping container. Airfoam weighs about half a pound per cubic foot and can float between 60-100lbs per cubic foot of foam. We plan to line the container with this foam, using about 23% of the whole container. Usually, Airfoam is used as insulation for houses, but since we discovered that it is actually pretty buoyant and is very light we realized we can use it to float shipping containers. We’ll line the shipping container on all sides and inside any cracks; this will ensure the container floats high in the water, rather than sinking if it falls off a cargo ship.
If the shipping container is lost at sea, it can take a long time and a lot of money to recover. Because of this, companies do not even try to recover lost containers. If the company doesn’t recover the shipping container, it can cause a potential hazard on many counts. One of those is acting as a hazard for water submersibles. When the shipping container is left for an amount of time, the shipping container will sink until the shipping container floats just at the surface of the water. So, underwater submersibles like submarines and even above-water ships like a fishing boat or even a cruise ship.
Another hazard it poses if the shipping container falls overboard and into the ocean is polluting the area with contaminates inside the shipping container. One incident we had learned about researching this topic is in the 1990’s, a shipping container filled with 28,800 rubber ducks had fallen into the Northern Pasific near Alaska. Because of ocean currents, some ducks have been found in the shores of Washington and even Britan! Based on our research, the ducks didn’t do a lot of damage to the environment, but if a shipping container had something like microplastics inside it, the plastics could damage the environment around it and effect sea creatures and other living organisms like coral or even habitats.
And so, because of these factors, we decided to use Airfoam as a protector. Combined with this, we plan to use a beacon of light to use as a sign that a shipping container will be in front of a submersible if it is spotted in the night.
Links: Ocean pollution and marine debris | National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
The Story of Lego Shipwreck with 5 Million Pieces of Lego Lost at Sea
What happens when shipping containers get lost at sea and burst? | AP News
