To the layman’s eye, hawsers used in today’s harbors don’t look much different than the old hemp ropes of yesteryear. Yet appearances can be deceiving. “Only synthetic ropes can really meet the requirements of modern container ships,” explains Karl Mader, Global Business Manager at Perlon®-Monofil. That’s because they can withstand much greater tensile forces and are much more durable than natural-fiber ropes. For example, Atlas® ropes can hold weights of up to 190 tons, the equivalent of five fully laden trucks. “To restrain such a load, a natural-fiber rope of a similar strength would have to be much thicker. So thick, in fact, that it would be virtually impossible to handle, either by hand or machine,” Mader explains. By the same token, steel cables are not sufficiently flexible and also difficult to handle. Obviously then, the need to moor increasingly larger container ships presents a compelling argument in favor of synthetic ropes. Yet strength alone is by no means the only decisive factor.