gCaptain - Maritime & Offshore » voyage_data_recorder

Survivability Of The VDR – Voyage Data Recorders.

gCaptain Staff — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 22:41:54 +0000

A plane crashes scattering debris across the ocean floor and boats, equipped with sonar tracking and ROV’s, begin their search for a black box containing answers. But what happens when a ship sinks?

Eyewitness statements from the Deepwater Horizon’s bridge team have provided clues about the failure of critical safety devices but human memory remains weak, a fact proven by conflicting testimony we heard this week. Realizing the importance of voice recordings to incident investigations the International Maritime Organization passed resolutions in 1997 requiring ships to carry Voyage Data Recorders (VDRs) which record a myriad of digital information including conversations on the bridge. The Deepwater Horizon had a VDR but, while we do not know the fate of the unit, it has yet to be found.

One primary difference between aviation and rig disasters is the quantity of fuel carried. Metal objects alone do not create flames, rather it is the fuel contained within an vehicle that provides the means for combustion. When a plane crashes it falls from the sky with a relatively small amount of fuel and once this fuel is consumed the fire naturally subsides. But, connected to an enormous reservoir of fuel, a rig will continue to burn until it sinks and the fire is naturally extinguished. VDRs are required to withstand fire for 10 hours but was the duration and intensity of the Horizon fire enough to melt the unit?

Pictures taken just prior to the rig sinking suggest this is the case or, possibly, the brackets which secured it to the rig’s deck melted off. We’ll have to wait until ROVs dive on the wreckage to know if the VDR survived fire. A few companies manufacture VDRs design to store the data recordings in the vessel’s EPIRB. But EPIRBS require either manual activation, consuming valuable seconds in a high intensity escape, or automatic activation, requiring that the rig sinks prior to the unit melting.

And there are still more problems. Even if the VDR had been recovered we still would not know the primary cause of the blowout because maritime regulations do not require the mounting of microphones in the driller’s cabin or the logging of even the simplest drilling data. Even where microphones do exist there placement can lead to poor audio quality. Traditional VDRs also fail to record other information critical in the digital age like electronic distress messages, emails and telephone calls.

In looking at the next generation of VDRs it’s clear that the spectrum of information stored in these units needs to include drilling data. Microphones in other critical spaces should also be considered. We also have to ask if the storage of data needs to be redundant. Locating a secondary watertight VDR in the hull of a ship could improve the chances of survivability. Another option, on vessels equiped with high speed satellite internet, would be uploading the data via satellite to a secure data center ashore.

The silver lining of all incidents is the lessons we learn, the improvements we make and the ideas generated thinking about potential failures. So we ask what features would you like incorporated in the next generation of VDRs? Please leave your ideas in the comments section below.

Cosco Busan – Radar Images And NTSB Transcript

John Konrad — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 12:25:01 +0000

Back in November we worked with a number of organizations to bring you the path of the Cosco Busan on the day of its allision with San Francisco’s Bay Bridge (article link). Today, in response to Paul Drouin’s article “Pilotage Paradox – A Look Into The Cosco Busan Allision“, our friend Professor Kurt Schwehr has compiled the radar images of the incident on his blog. Take a look: LINK

You can find our full coverage of the incident on our tag page: Cosco Busan Articles.

Cosco Busan – Questions,Questions,Questions

John Konrad — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 23:56:32 +0000

By Bob Couttie

Once the US National Transportation Safety Board has produced the transcripts of the voyage data recorder from the Cosco Busan (Formerly the Hanjin Cairo, the Hanjin name remains on the ship side) we’ll have a better idea of who said what to whom and when. Currently only the pilot’s version of events is available and it is raising a number of questions.

A malfunctioning radar appears to have been an element, though not the cause, of the incident and so far there has been no indication regarding the second radar on the ship’s bridge. Given that there was poor visibility, was the speed of the vessel excessive? Should departure have been delayed until the fog cleared.

The pilot was not familiar with the ECDIS equipment onboard, which does not appear to have malfunctioned. When the pilot asked the Captain to point out the centre of the bridge span the captain allegedly pointed to the bridge support and the pilot navigated accordingly.

With an apparently malfunctioning radar and a lack of familiarity with the primary method of navigation, did the pilot seek to confirm the vessels position with the VTS and/or the accompanying tug?

VTS informed the pilot that the ship was off course, which the Pilot disputed and shortly afterwards a lookout shouted a warning that there was a bridge support ahead and the vessel went hard right and allided with the Delta bridge support.

There also appears to have been a lack of detail in the master/pilot exchange when the latter took conduct of the vessel, as the pilot’s lawyer admits. Would the missing information have been enought to prevent the incident?

There may also have been communications problems between the American pilot and the bridge team who were Chinese. Of there were, to what extent did they reduce the pilot and the bridge team’s situational awareness?

It is not uncommon for pilots to ‘go it alone’ rather than work with a bridge team with whom communication is problematic. This increases the workload on the pilot and reduces his situational awareness. Had the pilot and the bridge team undergone bridge team/bridge resource management training?

Incidents such as this rarely have a single cause, or a single responsible individual. They are usually the result of systemic problems with Bridge Team Management, leadership, culture and navigational practices.

It will be a while before we know the full story of the Cosco Busan, but we’ll hit that bridge when we get to it.

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Bob Couttie has written for a number of maritime industry publications, including the prestigious Lloyd’s List International daily newspaper and Lloyd’s Ship Manager magazine. His reportage on problems with ship’s officer certification examinations in the Philippines in the late 1990s influenced the adoption of computerized examinations for ship officers by the country’s Professional Regulatory Commission.

Bob currently writes and produces podcasts for The Maritime Accident Casebook

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