In nautical terminology, stowage is the amount of room available for stowing materials aboard a ship, tank or an airplane. In

container shipping Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using intermodal containers (also called shipping containers and ISO containers). Containerization is also referred as "Container Stuffing" or "Container Loading", which is the pr ...

, stowage planning refers to the arrangement of

containers A container is any receptacle or enclosure for holding a product used in storage, packaging, and transportation, including shipping. Things kept inside of a container are protected on several sides by being inside of its structure. The ter ...

on board a container vessel. The stowage of a container ship involves different objectives, such as to optimize the available space and prevent damage to the goods, and more importantly, to minimize the time the vessel spends at the port terminal. Containers will be arranged depending on their

destinations :''This article covers a Girl Scouts event: for vacation destinations see Vacation spot (disambiguation)'' Girl Scout Destinations, formerly Wider Opportunities or Wider Ops, are events for individual Girl Scouts (ages 11 – 18) hosted by GSUS ...

(those going to the first port calls in the schedule will be placed on top), cargo weight (lighter containers are stored on top of heavier ones), cargo nature (dangerous goods containers normally are placed at the end of ship, and on upper deck to minimize the loss, in case of fire or leakage), etc. In the past, this process was done by the ship's captain, merely based on his experience. Today, it has become more automated with optimization software.

References

Shipbuilding Nautical terminology Cargo ships {{Water-transport-stub