Over 700 comments posted to the gCaptain forum by maritime professionals, explaining what caused the Costa Concordia to sink early this year… but the single best lesson learned was don’t sail large ships *especially ones carrying thousands of passengers* close to hard objects.
Seems like simple advice, right? Well it’s a message that some cruise ship captains have yet to learn. Cruise Junkie, a blog written by Ross Klein, a Professor at Memorial University in Newfoundland, brings us photos of the MSC cruise ship Lirica conducting a flyby of the MSC containership Lauren in the waters just south of Sicily. According to Klien the Lirica was traveling at a speed of 17 knots on a voyage from Kuwait to Hamburg when she came within 1â„10 of a nautical mile of the other ship!
We are unsure what is documented in the Lirica Captain’s standing orders in regard to minimum CPA, or the company’s operating procedures on collision avoidance but, I believe most maritime experts will agree, this is not a safe maneuver in open water.
