Thanks to reefer ships, you can now enjoy fruits and food items not locally grown or made in your country. Picking a hand of banana in Wal-Mart might seem natural to you, but the fruit have logged some miles across an ocean in reefer ships store area. Thanks to refrigerated ships store area, you don’t have to travel to foreign land to taste these not-so-exotic fruits and food items from other countries. Even ordinary cargo ships can also transport perishables and other items through refrigerated container vans that act like huge mobile freezers.

Reefer ships

A reefer is a special cargo ship in that they concentrate on transporting perishable goods such as food products and sometimes medical supplies as well. Often they are small but fast ships to reach their destination before their cargo loses their freshness or usability. Reefer ships are usually painted white or bright colors that reflect the sun’s rays to help in the refrigeration of the ship. Although cargo ships can also carry perishables in refrigerated containers, but they are limited by their power generation capacity – they could only carry so much refrigerated containers. Reefers on the other hand are built for this purpose; some reefers’ entire cargo hold is temperature controlled.

Reefer ships’ store area

The most popular way of carrying perishables onboard reefers is through refrigerated containers that has their own independent refrigeration system. The power generation capability of reefers is enough to power these containers plus the ship’s own refrigeration system in the cargo hold. Frozen items that need the full use of refrigerator systems’ capacity are stored on the deck either in individual containers or the ships store area. This way the crew can easily monitor the system and the temperature inside each storage area. Food items that only need chilling such as fruits and vegetables are stored in the cargo hold that has its own refrigerating capacity too.

Cargo ships’ refrigerated containers

Most cargo ships can carry a limited number of refrigerated containers; they are limited by their power generation capacity. There are also not enough deckhands to check each refrigerated container regularly if their full TEU capacity is entirely refrigerated containers. Cargo ships, however, need refrigerated containers because they transport other refrigerated items such as medical supplies and some food products. These refrigerated containers are strategically placed on top of non-refrigerated ones and close to rails for easy access during temperature inspection.