“A charterparty for the carriage of logs contained a clause, 66, which made the tendering of NOR at loadport conditional on Owners' promise that "...the Vessel's holds will be clean, dry and free of cargo residues...". Upon arrival at loadport the vessel's holds were found to be infested and the authorities ordered fumigation. Although Owners contended that infestation was not contemplated by clause 66, the Tribunal held the NOR invalid as the presence of insects was in any event a breach of the duty under common law regarding the condition of the holds and the vessel was not ready until fumigation had been completed.”

“Owners and their co-insured Bank claimed on the war risk insurance following the boarding and setting on fire of the Vessel in the Gulf of Aden in 2011. The Court had struck out Owners' claim, for disobedience to a disclosure order. The Bank nonetheless continued, arguing that (even in the event of Owners' wilful default — as contended by insurers) it could rely on the insured perils. The Court found that the Vessel had indeed been scuttled and, as a result, "piracy" was unavailable, as objectively, the event was motivated by attempted fraud on insurers rather than fortuitous theft of the Vessel; "persons acting maliciously" did so in furtherance of the fraudulent plan rather than by spite or ill-will; the same applied to "malicious mischief'; senseless rather than orchestrated damage was required for "vandalism" and an intention to frustrate intended use of property for "sabotage". The Bank's claim therefore failed.”

“An amended Baltimore Form C Berth Grain CP provided in CI.14 that NOR to load "must be delivered ... between 0800 hours and 1700 hours ..Monday to Friday, between 0800 ... and 1100 ... on Saturday, ....Laytime is to commence 0800 hours the next working day...." and in CI.16 for a right to cancel should NOR "not be delivered as per Clause 14 by...noon on... [10th May]." NOR was tendered at 0704 on Sunday 10 May. On appeal from an arbitration, the Court upheld Charterers' cancellation, holding that NOR could not be served on a Sunday: terms identifying what is a valid NOR have a commercial purpose and to hold that an NOR could be valid for one purpose (laytime) but not another (cancelling) would create uncertainty in the face of the parties' attempt to create certainty.”

“The High Court held that a solicitor's automatic email signature was proof of signature of a disputed settlement, the terms of which were confirmed by email. Even though automatically generated, the signature at the footer could only be present because of a conscious decision to insert the contents, whether in a particular case or more generally in all cases. Furthermore, the recipient had no reason to suppose that the presence of the signature may have been unknown to the sender.”

“BSGR challenged an arbitration award against it for US$1.247 billion arising out of a joint venture with Vale exploiting iron ore deposits in Guinea. The Court declined BSGR's application to set aside an order granting Vale permission to enforce the award as a judgment — or to stay the same — on the grounds that there was a presumption that enforcement could proceed notwithstanding the challenge, there was no public policy defence, the challenge (being based solely on arbitrator bias) was not one obviously going to succeed, there was no evidence that if the challenge succeeded Vale would be unable to repay, nor any other concerns militating against enforcement.”

“Under a time charterparty on amended NYPE 1946 form, the vessel failed the hose test on her arrival to loadport and was placed off hire. Owners claimed hire submitting that the hose test that took place was too stringent and uncontractual, i.e. far in excess of standard practice in the industry. The Tribunal held that it was not possible to conclude that the hose test was not carried out in accordance with the IACS guidelines as there was no reason for the surveyor to do so nor was it credible that the crew should accede to a request to carry out an irregular test without lodging a formal note of protest. The claim therefore failed.”