MAC has a particular distaste for psuedoscience. If someone makes claims that they refuse to back up with solid, peer-reviewed evidence he shows them the door. Typically, a claim will be made that is not testable or verifiable, sometime the woo-woo vendor will demand that MAC gives him a considerable amount of money before evidence will be given that something actually works. Now lets discuss The Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands.

We’ve seen the PR release, but it doesn’t say much and is, frankly, a disappointment. The Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands boasts that “For the first time ever some of the reasons why containers are lost overboard have been investigated by the pioneering Lashing@Sea project, that has just completed after three years of intensive research.”

I can hear the squeak as you move to the edge of your seat, awaiting for The Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands to impart this vital information. Unsqueak and sit back. You’re not going to get it.

If you ask what are some of the reasons it refers to, you’ll have a hard time finding out. Whatever the report apparently says, mere mortals are not entitled, in view of the researchers, to know. It is rather like someone saying: “I have the cure for the common cold, but you are not allowed to say what it is.

If the claim: “For the first time ever some of the reasons why containers are lost overboard have been investigated by the pioneering Lashing@Sea project” is true then why are these reasons not being published and made public? Secrecy and opacity has been the bane of maritime safety for decades. Which lifeboats kill most seafarers? It is a commercial secret that you must not ask. Your life is at risk because your life is less important than the lifeboat manufacturer’s.

Now the The Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands makes a claim that it declines to allow you to verify. That means that you, as a seafarer, as a ship’s officer, aboard a containership, have no way of taking those lessons to make your ship safer.

Says the praise release: “A monitoring campaign of five ships in operation, model tests of secured cargo and an extensive survey asking crew for their input was conducted in the container, ro-ro and heavylift sectors. A consortium of 24 participants representing flag states, classification societies, shipowners and lashing equipment manufacturers, as well as crew from nearly 160 vessels, took part in the project that was sponsored by the Dutch government. “The Dutch government, together with the British and Swedish maritime administrations, are set to make several recommendations to the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) and the International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) in a bid to improve safety levels and operational efficiency. The industry-wide project was led by the Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands (MARIN).

“Participants included: Maersk Ship Management, CMA CGM, Danaos ship management, Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics, Norfolk line, NYK / Monohakobi Technology Institute, Royal Wagenborg, Spliethoff / BigLift Shipping, United European Car Carriers (UECC), ABS, Bureau Veritas, Det Norske Veritas, Germanischer Lloyd, Lloyds Register, Directoraat Generaal Luchtvaart en Maritieme Zaken (DGLM), the Dutch Shipping Inspectorate, Swedish Transport Agency, Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA), German Lashing, MacGregor, SEC, Amarcon, MariTerm, SIRI Marine and MARIN.”

It says all that, but keeps the report itself secret. Why?

Hmmm.

When the Maritime Research Institute of the Netherlands acts as a scientific body should do, which is to put its findings in the public domain and make them available for peer review then maybe its praise release can be taken seriously. That is how real science works.

Secrecy for commercial reasons is inimical to the safety of the lives of seafarers. Seafarers have a right to know what hazards they face regardless of any commercial inconvenience it may cause. We know that such secrecy in the lifeboat industry has cost seafarers lives.

It was not so much Transport Canada’s decision to investigate the capsize and sinking of the Barbados-flagged  sailing vessel Concordia that raised questioning eyebrows as the apparent implication that TSB did not trust the Barbadian maritime authority to do the job properly. The issues surrounding the investigation of what happened to the 58 metre tallship Concordia and the subsequent search and rescue operations, SAR, may go somewhat deeper.

Concordia, built in Poland and completed in 1992, apparently capsized swiftly and without warning on 17 February off the coast of Brazil. Its 64 passengers and crew were rescued 40 hours later by a merchant ship and subsequently transferred to Brazilian Navy rescue helicopters.

Concordia was registered as a sail-training yacht and operated as a “floating classroom” by Class Afloat, for which it was built. It is Canadian-owned and operated out of the port of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia.

What caused the capsize is yet to be determined. Some accounts suggest that she was knocked down by a microburst, a brief strong downblast of air that has been blamed for aircraft crashes and ship losses. Descriptions of what happened to Concordia are very similar to accounts of the losses of the Albatross, also a floating classroom, in 1961 and Pride of Baltimore in May 1986.

Another potential culprit may be keel failure. There has been rising concern regarding keel failures from yachts for some years.  In 2006 the yacht Moquini  was lost with all hands during the Mauritius to Durban Yacht Race apparently due to keel failure. In April 2006 ten Dubois 68 vessels participating in the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race were diverted to Subic Bay Freeport for seven weeks after problems appeared with keel bolts loosening. The discovery was largely accidental and examination showed the problem existed throughout the fleet.

For the moment, however, the cause of the Concordia sinking remains unknown.

Barbados, Concordia’s flag state is a white-list registry. It has announced an investigation which will also cover the Brazilian SAR response. Brazil’s navy has been criticised for an allegedly tardy response, which the navy disputes.

Currently little is known of the Barbados expertise in maritime accident investigation. Of 15 casualties involving vessels in the Barbados registry lodged with the IMO since 1996 only one records a report being lodged with the IMO and none can be found online. This is not unusual among open registries, an unfortunate number of which consider accident investigation reports to be confidential between the flag-state and the shipowner rather than a matter of improving safety. Such investigation, one may suspect, are unlikely to find much wrong with the shipowner’s management.

In 2006 Barbados announced the implementation of safety-based, open investigations. However, it has, as yet, failed to demonstrate a commitment to transparency.

Such a lack of transparency will not sit well with Canada since the vessel was Canadian-owned and 48 Canadians were aboard at the time.

Brazil, as the coastal state, may also launch an investigation by the Comissão de Investigação e Prevenção dos Acidentes da Navegação, CIPANAVE. This is, however, under the authority of the Brazilian Navy, which would raise concerns about its independence in an investigation which must necessarily examine the SAR effectiveness of the Brazilian Navy.

In fact, recently, Brazil has made greater efforts to actively engage the maritime safety and investigation community and greater transparency. It may be that Brazil’s investigation capabilities are independent and that its military superiors support that independence.

Rightly or wrongly any investigation carried out by Brazil will necessarily be assumed to be tainted by self-interest on the part of the navy. Ceasar’s wife must not be beyond reproach, she must be seen to be beyond reproach.

Inevitably, there is a political aspect. Given the circumstances a Canadian government minister will be required to face the country’s parliament and a vibrant opposition, and the Canadian public and a free and questioning press, to field questions surrounding the investigation.

It is, to say the least, difficult to conceive such a minister being able to persuade parliament, the public and the media that such an investigation may safety be left in the hands of a registry run out of a London office under contract with the Barbados government, whose purpose is to raise funds for that government, with no publicly verifiable competence or integrity in maritime accident investigation.

Those who wish to read the entrails of this nautical goat will read closely the official statement by the TSB. An investigation of this sort has defined objectives: How did the incident happen, why did it happen and what can be done to reduce the chances of it happening again.  It is not unusual for two or more agencies with significant interest to work together on an incident which covers different jurisdictions.

Says TSB: “Since the accident, the TSB has gathered information, in accordance with its own procedures, in order to assess the occurrence. Having gathered enough information to complete its assessment, the TSB decided to conduct a parallel investigation into this accident independently of the Barbadian investigation. The TSB made the decision to investigate because the scope and methodology used to uncover causes and contributing factors will likely be different than that of the Barbados authority.”

There is much in that statement, none of it encouraging for the credibility of the Barbados registry.

(Gatineau, Quebec, March 3, 2010) – The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) has decided to conduct a safety investigation (M10F0003) into the capsizing and sinking of the sailing vessel (SV) Concordia, which occurred on February 17, 2010, off the coast of Brazil.

Barbados, the flag state of the SV Concordia, has opened an investigation.

Since the accident, the TSB has gathered information, in accordance with its own procedures, in order to assess the occurrence. Having gathered enough information to complete its assessment, the TSB decided to conduct a parallel investigation into this accident independently of the Barbadian investigation. The TSB made the decision to investigate because the scope and methodology used to uncover causes and contributing factors will likely be different than that of the Barbados authority. Meanwhile, in accordance with the provisions of international conventions, the TSB remains committed to providing assistance to the Barbados authority as it proceeds with its investigation.

On February 17, 2010, at approximately 14:22 local time, the SV Concordia capsized and sank off the coast of Brazil; the 64 passengers and crew were rescued 40 hours later by a merchant ship and subsequently transferred to Brazilian Navy rescue helicopters.

IMO 15 incidents since 1996

Only one report appears to have been logged with the IMO

http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/medias-media/communiques/marine/2010/comm_m10f0003.asp

We know that because the company itself boasts “Our companies are 100% owned by United States citize (sic) and vessel flies proudly the flag of the United States of America!”. It is unlikely that the United States of America will be proud of the vessel, owned by Majestic Blue Fisheries LLC, which flies its flag.

Until 2009 the vessel,a purse seiner working Western and Central Pacific Ocean tuna fishery along with a sister ship, Pacific Breeze, was registered in South Korea then moved to the US flag. She carried a crew of 23 with, originally a Korean Captain and chief officer, with most of the rest of the crew being unlicensed seafarers from Indonesia and the Philippines. When the ship was registered in the US, the Korean captain became the fishmaster and Captain Pine joined as Captain. It was an uncomfortable relationship.

Alerted by Steve Gordon of law firm Gordon & Elias, MAC spoke with Doug Pine in Tawara, Kiribati, by cellphone. “As a human being it was appalling to witness, on an American ship, seafarers being beaten,” says Pine. He recalls the first beating he witnessed: “I was sitting in my chair on the navigation bridge with a pleasant young Indonesian, the equivalent of a third officer, near me. Suddenly, the chief engineer came in and punched him with his fist, with full force, then kicked him with full force between the buttocks. Sometime the chief engineer would use a bamboo stick, hitting him about the shoulders, neck and head”.

Pine posted standing orders around the vessel prohibiting further beatings. Some of the crew quietly thanked him, but he believes it may still have continued out of sight. “I think they came to accept the beatings,” he says.

Pine found it difficult to exercise his authority almost from the moment he first boarded the vessel: “The first day I was aboard I asked for the crew list It was ordered by rank. I was Number Two, the fishmaster was number 1. The second officer refused a direct order to change it. The Korean officers refused to obey any routine command activity.”

In fact, Pine was supposed to simply be a ‘paper captain’ to meet the requirements of the US flag and to accept the authority of the fishmaster, the former captain. Pine was unable to manoeuver the vessel or use the navigation equipment on the bridge.

He believes that there was a conspiracy between the ship’s officers and the owners to commit mutiny.

The Korean officers refused to comply with MARPOL regulations, claims Pine. A vessel waste management plan was posted throughout the ship but ignored, even though the vessel had an adequate incinerator ad oily-water separator. “I brought it up at the monthly safety meetings but was ignored,”says Pine, who has video and photographic evidence that the Korean officers ‘intentionally and wilfully” disposed of plastics wastes and oil wastes at sea: ”They didn’t want to waste fuel by using the incinerator”, he says.

When Pine attempted to organise the vessel to arrive in Tarawa, Kiribati for and inspection, the fishmaster ignored him.

When Pine went to the bridge to check the ship’s position the fishmaster began screaming at him, pounding the chart table with his fist and, when the chief officer came onto the bridge pointing at Captain Pine in a way that made him fear physical violence. Pine managed to smuggle a the ship’s satellite phone off the bridge, returned to his cabin and telephoned his wife who recorded a message asking for assistance to be passed on to the US Coast Guard.

After a while in his cabin things quietened down and he was able to return to the bridge and send a couple of emails then received a message from the Majestic Blue’s sister ship, Pacific Breeze that he had a message from the coast guard. Later he received a VHF communication from the Coast Guard asking him to attend a ‘pre-inspection meeting’.

“It was a sort of coded message”, says Pine. He returned to his cabin, collected his belongings and left the ship at Tawara by pilot boat on the morning of 18 October.

Since then he has stayed in Tarawa being interviewed by the US Coast Guard, accompanied by his wife.

For Captain Doug Pine the nightmare is over, for the remaining crew of Majestic Blue it will continue, at least for the time being.

And Majestic Blue Fisheries of Guam is looking for an American captain to board its all American-owned purse seiner flying that all-American flag.

(With thanks to Steve Gordon)

Here we have an instructor, apparently in Eastern Europe, doing an STCW course. He’s not wearing a hardhat, nor is he wearing a lifejacket. This tells us that he’s not teaching safety, and not teaching safely. He’s only teaching the students to pass STCW certification, not the safety lessons that might keep them alive and injured when they’re on a ship.

If the instructor isn’t taking safety seriously, will his students?

Isle of Man instructors are in Malaysia investigating the collision between the tanker Formosaproduct Brick and Ostende Max, which cost nine seafarers their lives. The Manx investigators do a good job and despite current attempts to hustle things along they know their business well enough to take the time necessary to do the job right.

It’s quite a complex investigation which will cover how the collision happened, how the Formosaproduct Brick caught fire, how the fire was fought and why the nine fatalities occurred, whether the Vessel Traffic Service was on the ball and whether the incident response was timely and appropriate.

It is likely, however, that liability issues and fear of legal action against the two vessels’ officers will hamper the gathering of necessary information for the safety investigation.

It does seem to have some similarities to the 1993 British Trent/Western Winner incident. Hopefully it will have a more satisfactory resolution.

The trouble with speculating about what’s happened to the vessel is that there are simply too many options and not enough facts. Taken by the crew? Hijacked by the Russian Mafia or a disgruntled business interest? Suddenly sunk by a rogue wave? Taken by Somali pirates sporting long range tanks on their skiff outboards? Did she ever actually leave the Baltic? Take a number, but it certainly has got the attention of the security services: Arctic Sea passed through some of the heaviest traffic lanes and patrolled areas on the planet and vanished on the way. Or did she?

That story will run and run for a while but the fate of the Langeland and its six crew off the coast of Sweden as she sought a safe haven in bad weather has already faded from what limited attention it did get. Notably within days the wreck of the vessel was found an ROVs sent down to inspect her. A similar search for the missing m/v Rezzak has been a no-go because, we’ve been told, none of the concerned parties want to pay for sidescan sonar to find her.

Ferries in developing countries continued to take their toll in Incident number three: the sinking of the Princess Ashika off Tonga with more than 90 now missing. It is an enormous blow to the island nation.A Royal Commission has been set up to investigate the incident.

Somalia still gets the lion’s share of attention when it comes to piracy so it’s worth remembering that, out of the spotlight, it’s still continuing in the South China Sea with some seven vessels attacked since January, the most recent being the Singaporean-register tug Tahir on August 2.

Don’t be surprised to hear that the Danish Maritime Authority wants to tighten up, if that’s the phrase, on alcohol on ships after the report on the grounding of the Karin Schepers. ““He first realized that the ship was aground when a man he did not know came on the bridge…” says the DMA report on the incident, he being the chief officer who was asleep on the bridge, drunk and with the bridge watch alarm switched off and the ‘man he did not know’ being a pilot from a passing vessel. Read the report to brighten your day.

If you’re quick you might catch the BBC Radio 4 documentary on the British merchant navy, Under The Red Duster, which for once giving the seafarer a bit of the attention he deserves for keeping the world afloat. You can listen to it online.

A container crane collapse during ship loading at Southampton Container Terminal on July 13 has raised serious issues about dock workers and ship crews’ safety in which the investigative authority, namely the Health & Safety Executive, HSE, does not emerge entirely unblemished.

The incident, which left the crane driver, 33-year old Mr Jay Squibb, with life-threatening injuries closely copied a similar crane collapse 19 months ago involving the same crane manufacturer and design at the same berth, the report on which dock operators are still awaiting.

Such investigations must always be painstaking and never rushed but is it unreasonable to ask why such investigations should take so astoundingly long before findings are made public, especially as such reports could prevent future, far worse accidents?

The terminal operator, DP world, which owns 51% of the operation, partnered with Associated British Ports, who own 49%, says the latest crane collapse is unlikely to be related to the previous incident yet the similarities seem to be more than coincidental. Both cranes of the same design, of which there are no other examples in the UK, were made by the defunct British manufacturer, Morris Cranes, in the early 1990s and both were subsequently altered.

In the earlier incident, crane 8 had undergone a 4 mt boom extension by crane contractor, Seward Wyon, during 2006 to enable it to handle bigger vessels. No one was injured in that incident but ship-side operations had to be suspended as a safety precaution and all 11 ship-to-shore cranes were taken out of service and checked one by one by HSE inspectors. The knock-on effects were costly, as it involved the temporary closure of the Swindon-based Honda car factory after its JIT delivery system was disrupted.

Alterations to crane 6 in the latest incident involved raising the crane by 5 mt in 2004. There were no strong winds when the crane’s twin boom collapsed onto the container ship, NYK Themis, and damage to the ship required only minor repairs to one hatch cover but at least four containers were damaged. The incident, however, could have been far worse.

Health and safety officials have identified “some significant lines of enquiry” but Mike Wilcock, the HSE regional head of operations, refused to elaborate on such lines. HSE has, however, requested that the two similar cranes at the terminal be withdrawn from service until further notice and has issued some precautionary advice to the port’s industry. HSE is also telling all users of workshop port cranes made by Morris to carry out urgent safety tests. He added that a team of HSE staff, including inspectors, a specialist mechanical engineer and a metallurgist are working on the investigation which would take “some time” to reach a conclusion. It is to be hoped that, unlike the previous accident, it will not exceed an elephant’s gestation period before findings are made public.

There is serious concern among UK port workers about safety issues and Unite, the union to which, Mr Squibb belongs, says “The matter is of paramount importance”. One dock worker who returned to work after the incident told the local Daily Echo newspaper that he believes staff play “Russian roulette” when they get into cranes, but their concerns are not enough to keep them away. “It isn’t necessarily about he crane maintenance. It is the fact that at any time we can lift locked on boxes and it can cause a crane to collapse,” he said.

Speculation into the accident’s causes at this stage may not be very helpful but the incident, perhaps, stresses the need to hasten the proposed installation of weighers on dock handling equipment, preferably on straddle carriers, reach stackers, and the like before containers are marshalled under a gantry crane’s operational apron. At DP World’s Southampton terminal none of its cranes or straddle carriers is fitted with a weigher, although all machinery is designed to cut out if containers exceed a machine’s safe working load.

All lifting machines also usually have a generous overload margin but even that could be exceeded in certain circumstances involving weather conditions and deliberate, fraudulent under declaration of container payload weights by consignors and container stuffers. This practice costs container shipping lines, ports and governments billions of pounds in lost revenues every year, and imperils ships, their crews and the environment.

There is, however, some good news in that Mr Squibb is out of intensive care and showing positive signs of recovery.

Vessels without enough crew ‘are a hazard to shipping’
Scotsman
… the officer of the watch had been asleep for over three hours before the accident, while the vessel ploughed on like an unguided missile.

Mallorca target of Spain’s second attack in two days
Christian Science Monitor
… took the unusual step of shutting the island’s airport and ship terminals, effectively sealing off the island from the outside world for a few hours.

Sharp rise in crew abandonment cases
Lloyd’s List – London,UK
Another example — taken at random from the Lloyd’s MIU casualty service — is … to approval at the International Maritime Organization and International

Fire disrupts Atlantic ferry services for second straight day
The Canadian Press
A firefighter and one crew member were taken to hospital after the fire in the heating unit of the ferry. The vessel returned to North Sydney after the fire

Napoli salvage is declared over
BBC News
It was being taken to Portland in Dorset when the decision was taken to deliberately ground the vessel to try to prevent pollution damage to the world

Barge operators ask Marina to exclude them from CPC requirement …
Business Mirror
“Not all vessels will meet an accident. That is why there should be an actuarial study and the same should be done per sector since financial responsibility

US Congress Working on 2010 Appropriations for Loran-C and eloran …
Inside GNSS
eloran also has strong support from the General Lighthouse Authorities (GLA) of the UK and Ireland (equivalent to USCG for maritime safety,

Interferry joins IMO ro-pax safety review
Maritime Journal
The expert group submitted an initial report to the IMO’s Maritime Safety Committee after meeting for the first time during the recent MSC 86 session in

PIRACY/CRIME

Bill requiring cruise lines to share reports of on-board crime …
Gaea Times
The Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act tightens restrictions on an industry that has long evaded much scrutiny — in part because of the complexity of

UNDER THE RADAR

Fire destroys replica of 17th-century Dutch flagship, a major …
By Bureau News
Fire destroys replica of 17th-century Dutch flagship, a major tourist attraction. Bureau News. July 30th, 2009. Fire guts replica of 17th-century tall ship. AMSTERDAM — Fire consumed a replica of the 17th-century flagship of the Dutch

Expert gets in the middle of explosive situations

Explosives expert James Dahn was asked by Chinese officials for advice on transporting fireworks after a powerful blast had ripped through a cargo ship bound from Singapore to Hamburg. One crewman was killed, and a spectacular fire burned for four days on the 900-foot vessel.
That scenario could happen again, said Dahn of Rolling Meadows, who will discuss the dangers such cargoes present at a United Nations conference next month in Tokyo.

Mary Rose grant fully approved

Celebrations to mark the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII’s accession to the throne this year have come to a fitting culmination with the announcement that the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) has recently given full approval for a £21m grant to the Mary Rose Trust.

Sweden saw the collision of two ferries, Gotlandia and Gotlandia II, at Nynäshamn port, south of Stockholm, possibly with the help of a small barge. Some 15 injuries were reported. A boiler room fire, apparently in the thermal heating unit (thermal heating?! BDC) forced the ferry Atlantic Vision to return to port in Nova Scotia, the second fire on the vessel since December last year.  A smaller ferry, Captain, grounded on a boat launch on Balboa Island on July 21.

Apart from Atlantic Vision, fire ranged far and wide in the past seven days. Fire gutted a passenger-cum-cargo ship, MV Pemba at Dar es Salaam habour. Thiswas the second fire and fourth incident in Tanzanian waters in the past four months, which included a capsize with loss of life and another in which, says a Tanzanian report, “its backdoor fell off while in the Indian Ocean”. Three men were rescued, one sent to hospital, when the shrimp boat Kemo Sabay caught fire off Protection Island, in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the somewhat larger,2,545 grt, containership Forum Avarua suffered an engine room fire.

Two whale stories, one of which got worldwide coverage: Princess Cruise Lines’ Sapphire Princess, went inadvertently spear fishing with its bulbous bow and came up with a 70-tonne, rare, fin whale. At the other end of the scale of size and intelligence were the 32 passengers aboard the whale-watching boat which sank off Mayne Island, Canada – none were wearing lifejackets in the open inflatable.

Thanking their lucky stars this week were two seafarers from the coal carrier United Treasure whose scaffold collapsed while they were painting a hold, resulting in four badly broken legs, a broken arm and serious spinal bruising. Also in the lotof the fortunate were the 20 crew of the bulker Ioannis NK, rescued by helicopter after the ship capsized and sank 98 nautical miles off Cape Columbine on the West Coast, near to Saldanha Bay.

Inevitably, there were the aftermaths of tragedy: the burial of the first victim of the Aguila sinking and the naming of an oilman whose body was found after he went missing from the Brent Delta platform in the North Sea.

Be safe out there

Captain  Hristo Papukchiev, pictured right, is an unhappy man. How unhappy? Until April this year he was lead investigator for the Bulgarian Maritime Administration. Then, just a day after being tasked with leading the re-investigation of the sinking of the m/v Vanessa in a storm last year, he resigned.

So far, his story has only appeared in a Bulgarian-language magazine, Klass, online at Maritime Accident Casebook, and now, of course, here at gCaptain.

He joined the administration in October 2008 at about the same time as the sinking of the m/v Tolstoy with the loss of eight of her 10 crew, which became his first investigation. Despite attempts at delays interference he and his team completed the investigation and filed reports with EMSA and the IMO.

There were serious regulatory shortfalls revealed in the Tolstoy report – she had been deleted from the North Korean registry a year before the incident but still flew the DPRK flag, as well as shortcomings in the Bulgarian SAR system,which in fact was not in line with the description Bulgaria logged with the IMO.

Papukchiev believed there would be calls for action in response to the report.

Instead the report was shelved and no action taken. Neither the IMO nor EMSA encouraged Bulgaria to put its house in order. Today he suggests that if you’re in trouble in the Bulgarian area of responsibility it’s better to depend on a passing ship than the Bulgarian SAR system, which didn’t get underway until up to 10 hours after Tolstoy was on the seabed and around five hours after her EPIRB was activated. In fact the only two seafarers to survive the Tolstoy did so because they were picked up by a passing yacht.

No report has yet been issued on the sinking of m/v Vanessa, which lies undisturbed and unexamined in shallow waters. After Papukchiev accepted the task of re-investigating the loss, which cost the lives of nine crewmembers and a Ukrainian pilot with just one survivor, he was asked by a colleague “Who paid you to re-open the Vanessa case?”.

Says Papukchiev “I was shocked at first, but then started to ponder on the investigations done so far, the report that had been prepared long before my appointment, although not approved … Well, did this mean that its authors had been paid? Where were they now? These questions were my greatest concern, namely the Vanessa’s case had begun with a false start … Anyway, I was appointed to proceed with independent investigation because the society expected the truth to come to light. These investigations should be done very precisely and objectively, with facts prevailing not hypotheses. When there are no conditions for an unbiased and objective investigation, a true professional is obliged to resign.”

Bear that in mind if you’re in Bulgarian waters. We’re covering this story in depth at MAC.

Two recent casualties with particular lessons are the Scots scallop dredger Aquila on July 20 with the loss of three lives and the Asian Forest, which foundered 15 miles off Mangalore, fortunately without loss of life.

Commercial fishermen are often reluctant to wear lifejackets, feeling restricted in them, which almost certainly cost the lives of three of the four men aboard the Aquila. There is certainly an argument that commercial fishermen may benefit from a specially designed lifejacket but that’s not an argument to go without one.

Asian Forest foundered almost certainly because of liquefaction of her cargo of iron ore fines. It isn’t a cargo normally thought to be subject to liquefaction but at this time of year, with the South West Monsoon, heavy rains are soaking into iron ore fines stored in the open to await shipment  in New Mangalore and the West Coast of India, raising the moisture content.

It has been reported that often the moisture content stated on the certificate given by shippers bears no resemblance to the moisture content of the cargo at loading. If you’re loading such cargoes in South West India exercise extreme caution.

Stay safe out there.

–

Were you injured while working offshore?  Know your rights! Speak to maritime injury attorney today.

Chief Officer Charles P. Posas, has scored a dubious first in legal history. He is the first person to be charged with a violation of the US Anti-Invasive Species Law in addition to two felony counts of lying to the Coast Guard and violating recordkeeping laws. His superior, Captain Panagiotis Lekkas, is charged with violating anti-pollution laws, ship safety laws and obstructing a US Coast Guard investigation. Both have pleaded guilty in a Federal court in New Orleans, sentencing for both officers defendants is set for 14 October, 2009.

Says the US Department of Justice: “Posas is the first individual ever charged under the anti-invasive species law, a law designed to mitigate the introduction of marine invasive species into waters of the United States. Aquatic nuisance species are non-indigenous species that threaten the diversity or abundance of native species or the ecological stability of infested waters.

“Lekkas, who was the highest ranking officer aboard the ship, pleaded guilty to one count of violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships, one count of obstruction of justice and two counts of violating the Ports and Waterways Safety Act. Posas, who served as the vessel’s chief officer, pleaded guilty to one count of false statement and one count of violating the Nonindigenous Aquatic Nuisance and Prevention Control Act.”

Their vessel, M/V Theotokos, is owned by Liberia-based Mirage Navigation Corporation and managed by Polembros Shipping Limited.

In the summer of 2008, on passage from the Suez Canal to China, Lekkas and Posas suspected that the aftpeak ballast tank was leaking, but the crew was unable to confirm a leak during an inspection. Later, while at a dock, offloading cargo in China, Lekkas and Posas saw a crack of about 60 centimetres in the ship’s rudder stem. It was evident that water had passed through the crack because water was streaming out of it from inside of the ship. Lekkas reported the crack to company personnel, but failed to write a written report. Lekkas did not report it to the Coast Guard until he was confronted by Coast Guard inspectors in New Orleans.

In court documents, Lekkas admitted that he knew the crack could have adversely affected the safety and safe handling and operation of the vessel. No repairs were undertaken on the rudder stem crack until the Coast Guard ordered it repaired upon its discovery.

The Port and Waterways Safety Act, PWSA, requires that a vessel operator must report all hazardous conditions to the Coast Guard prior to arrival in a US port. Under the PWSA regulations, a hazardous condition does not have to be a definitive danger or imminent threat, but need only be a condition that may adversely affect the safety of any vessel, bridge, structure or shore area or the environmental quality of any port, harbour or navigable waterway of the United States..

The  US Coast Guard has notification processes in place for vessels arriving at US ports that have identified hazardous conditions onboard, such as excessive leaks and major equipment malfunctions. A vessel operator has several options available, including notifying the Coast Guard 96 hours prior to arrival of the hazardous condition or contacting the applicable ports’ 24-hour Sector Command Center or Vessel Traffic Service.

Through further investigation, the Coast Guard also found fuel was leaking, or “migrating”, from the deep fuel tanks into the forepeak ballast tank. Directly astern of the forepeak tank were two fuel tanks, known as the deep fuel tanks.

In mid-September 2008, Lekkas and Posas learned that fuel oil may have been leaking into the forepeak ballast tank because it was reported that the sounding tapes were dirty with oil. After opening the tank’s hatch, two inspections confirmed the presence of oil in the forepeak tank. Following this discovery, Captain Lekkas ordered the crew to undertake a cleaning operation that initially involved skimming the surface of the water in order to remove the oil. In order to facilitate further cleaning, Lekkas ordered the level of the liquid in the tank lowered by pumping it directly overboard through the ballast pump. As the liquid level was lowered the crew could clean more of the tank, with the cleaning operation expanding to rags and a portable pump. The discharged ballast liquid was contaminated with oil.

The Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships and its regulations require that discharges from the machinery spaces of a cargo ship must be fully and accurately recorded in the oil record book. This obligation extends to emergency, accidental, or other exceptional discharges of oil and oily mixtures. Lekkas ordered the ballast discharges and counter-signed each page of the oil record book, certifying its accuracy. However, none of the contaminated ballast water discharges were recorded in the Oil Record Book.

When the vessel was about two days out from arriving in New Orleans, in late September 2008, it was clear that oil was continuing to leak into the forepeak tank. Prior to entering the Mississippi River and about a day out from New Orleans, Lekkas ordered two fitters to fabricate and install an obstruction device onto the forepeak tank’s sounding tube so that during Coast Guard inspections, when taking a sounding, the results would only reveal water and not the presence of oil in the tank. The obstruction device consisted of a rubber hose with a metal stopper at the bottom end. Before being affixed to the sounding tube, the rubber hose was partially filled with water.

On Oct. 1, 2008, the Coast Guard boarded the M/V Theotokos near New Orleans in order to inspect the ship. During the inspection, the Coast Guard oversaw the sounding of the forepeak tank which indicated the presence of water in the tank but did not reveal the oil. Later, as part of the inspection, the Coast Guard had the crew open the hatch to the forepeak tank which revealed approximately one meter of oil in the tank. During the initial inspection, confined spaces safety regulations prevented the Coast Guard inspectors from retrieving the obstruction device. Although the inspection lasted another two days, Lekkas ordered the fitters to remove the rubber hose from the tank and restore the sounding tube to its original condition. The removal occurred before the Coast Guard had an opportunity to enter the tank.

In addition to the obstruction regarding the sounding pipe, Lekkas admitted in court documents that he knew about the fuel leak into the forepeak tank well before coming to New Orleans and that he chose not to report the leaks to the Coast Guard. Lekkas further admitted that the fuel migration may have adversely affected the safety of the M/V Theotokos or the environmental quality of US ports and shores because the oil contamination in the ballast system meant that captain could not have utilized the ballast system, with its attendant direct overboard discharges, without polluting the marine environment.

Additionally, during the inspection, a Coast Guard inspector asked to see complete ballast records for the Theotokos. Posas responded by physically handing the inspector a copy of the 27 September, 2008, ballast report, which is a report of soundings and volumes of water in the ballast system. Posas prepared, signed and maintained these reports as part of his duties as chief officer. In court documents Posas admitted, that at the time he presented the ballast report to the Coast Guard inspector, he knew that the form was false.

Maintenance of accurate ballast water records is required under Ballast Water Management for Control of Nonindigenous Species regulations promulgated under the Nonindigenous Aquatic Nuisance Prevention and Control Act.

“Invasive marine species are a serious problem that can be transmitted in the ballast water of oceangoing vessels. Today’s pleas should act as a warning to industry and crewmembers alike that we will investigate and prosecute those who ignore not only pollution laws but those laws designed to protect native species,” said John C. Cruden, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.

US Attorney Jim Letten noted, “The message should be clear that this office, in conjunction with its partnership with the US Coast Guard, the Department of Justice Environmental Crimes Section and all its law enforcement partners, will vigorously prosecute individuals who impede or obstruct the US Coast Guard’s mission and pollute our marine environment.”

“This case clearly demonstrates the Coast Guard’s commitment to work with our interagency partners to aggressively enforce all maritime anti-pollution and safety of life at sea laws. The breadth and magnitude of the investigation that underpinned the charges brought forth is a testament to the dedication of all persons who were involved in resolving this matter including the Coast Guard Investigative Service, the US Department of Justice‘s Environmental Crime Section, and the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana,” said Rear Admiral Mary Landry, Eighth District Coast Guard commander.