Guide · Ultra-cold
How to ship pharma and biotech product at −80 °C without losing it on the way.
At −80 °C there is no margin for a missed alert, an unsigned check or a logger nobody reads until the shipment is accepted.
Ultra-cold shipping moves product that must stay at around −60 °C to −80 °C, usually in insulated shippers packed with dry ice, from a dispatch freezer to a receiving freezer, with temperature evidence for the whole journey.
The three phases
| Phase | What has to go right |
|---|---|
| Dispatch | Container, loggers, dry ice, documents, vehicle and driver checked; release independently verified |
| Transit | Temperature watched live; dry ice topped up in time; every handoff sealed and timed |
| Delivery | Loggers downloaded before acceptance; product moved into the freezer quickly |
A pre-dispatch checklist
- Shipper qualified for the lane duration and season.
- Dry ice quantity calculated for the lane, including hub top-ups.
- Two loggers started, placed and recording.
- Dangerous-goods documents for dry ice prepared.
- Vehicle and driver confirmed; escalation contacts known.
- Release signed by two different people.
Where ultra-cold shipments fail
- The excursion is found only when the logger is downloaded at the destination.
- Dry ice is packed by habit and runs out before the next hub.
- A handoff at a cross-dock is verbal and unrecorded.
- An alert goes to one phone and nobody escalates it.
How UltraCold does it
UltraCold runs −60 °C and −80 °C shipments from freezer to freezer in three phases with their own controls: 22 at dispatch, 22 in transit and 24 at delivery. Any FAIL at dispatch holds the shipment, and release needs QA and warehouse to sign independently; the system refuses the same person twice. Two loggers are watched live: drift beyond ±2 °C around target raises an alert, and a breach of the configured hard limits for 30 minutes becomes an NCR with a 4-hour QA disposition deadline. Dry ice is calculated per lane from lane time and ambient profile, with exhaustion risk flagged at two hours of cover. Every cross-dock records seal and dwell time, a 12-trigger ladder escalates from the control tower to senior management, and everything is kept in a five-year audit log.
Questions
How do you ship product at −80 °C?
In a qualified insulated shipper with dry ice calculated for the lane, two running loggers, dangerous-goods paperwork for the dry ice, an independently verified release, live monitoring in transit and logger download before acceptance.
What is the biggest risk in ultra-cold shipping?
Finding an excursion only after delivery, when the logger is downloaded. Live monitoring lets the team act while the product is still cold.
Why use two loggers?
Two loggers give a cross-check if one fails or is placed badly, so a single faulty device does not decide the fate of the shipment.
See it on your own data. UltraCold — −80 °C, signed off at every step. Book a 30-minute working session with an engineer.