What is dangerous goods?

Dangerous goods are materials or items with dangerous properties that, if not properly controlled, pose potential risks to human health and safety, infrastructure or their means of transportation.

The transportation of dangerous goods is inspected and controlled by a variety of different regulatory authorities, there is a set of classifications for dangerous goods.

‘Dangerous goods’ are materials or items with hazardous properties which, if not properly controlled, present a potential hazard to human health and safety, infrastructure and/ or their means of transport. The transportation of dangerous goods is controlled and governed by a variety of different regulatory regimes, there is a set of classification for the dangerous goods. There are nine clauses in which the dangerous goods are classified. The dangerous goods labels and dangerous goods certificate for the cargo are issued as per the nine clauses which are explained as follows:

·      Classification 1 is for explosives. The same classification has six sub-divisions for materials which pose high explosive risk, low explosive risk, to name a few

·      Classification 2 is for gases. This claus has three sub-categories that talk about gases that are highly inflammable, that are not inflammable and gases that neither inflammable nor toxic

·      Classification 3 is for liquids and has no sub-divisions

·      Classification 4 is for solids. There are three sub-categories that deal with highly combustible solids, self-reactive solids and solids that when interact with water could emit toxic gases

·      Classification 5 is for substances that have the chances of oxidisation

·      Classification 6 is for all kinds of substances that are toxic and that could prove to be infective

·      Classification 7 is specifically for materials that are radioactive

·      Classification 8 is for materials that face the threat of corrosion and erosion

·      Classification 9 is for those substances that cannot be classified under any of the above heads but still are dangerous goods