Accidents and mishaps at sea

[skilly56]

One thing I overlooked in my little 'spout' below, is how much time seafarers of today have to spend doing paperwork!
Since ISM was introduced in 2000, the amount of time required to be spent on record-keeping for bunkers, MARPOL, Port State inspections, crew training exercises & Certificate of Competence validities, cargo records, ballast exchanges, Planned Maintenance System records, medical locker records, critical machinery records, etc, etc, has multiplied to a huge degree, mainly to keep an auditable record of events in case of an incident. The Voyage Data Recorder also records the telegraphs & movements, ship position, speed & course, and numerous other bits besides.

30 Years ago, most of this paperwork requirement didn't exist to anywhere near the volumes required today. And nowadays, the companies who require all this paperwork to be completed are also making it their prime goal to reduce the ship's manning! So who does all this extra work! The watchkeeper is not meant to be doing this stuff - he is meant to be on watch! However, to keep up with the ever-increasing demand to have records, it is invariably the watchkeeper who ends up doing it, which takes his concentration off his prime reason for being on watch!

I have written a couple of SOPEPS (Ships Oil Pollution Emergency Plan) during the 1990's, but I was banged up at the time with a couple of crushed vertebrae so couldn't pass the sea-going medical anyway. It kept my mind working during the long days of concentration, and I was quite chuffed to receive them back from Lloyd's of London with 'Approved - No Alterations Required' stamped through them. For someone on the ships to have done them while operating would have been impossible.

So, what I am emphasising is that there are many more distractions for watchkeepers today - maybe too many. In good daylight conditions, some ships now operate with only the OOW on the bridge (cargo vessels I mean - I have yet to see this practice on any passenger vessel I have been on). If the OOW falls over & becomes incapable, who will know, unless there is a dead man system installed? The only 3 ships I have been on with Dead Man systems installed, they had been deactivated!  Go Figure?

[Rod]

So, what I am emphasising is that there are many more distractions for watchkeepers today - maybe too many. In good daylight conditions, some ships now operate with only the OOW on the bridge (cargo vessels I mean -

That's a bit unfair Skilly ! At least some of the cargo lines allow a Labrador as an assistant.
English Channel 1978 I believe?

[Chris Thompson]

Dead Man systems

, very interesting Skilly.
I have a pal who is a freight train diver for CSX in the USA, apparently the trains are so automated that his basic function is to press a Dead Man's button every couple of minutes to let the locomotive know he is still there!
On the other hand though, due to the computerized control and accurate mapping of the lines and measurement of freight loading, CSX just announced that the effective fuel consumption allows them to move 1 Ton of freight 1000 Miles per gallon of fuel burned.....very impressive given that mileage per gallon was 400 only a few years ago.
Just did some quick math based on QE2 fuel consumption at 50ft per gallon....comes out to moving 1 Ton of QE2 500 miles per gallon....probably got my math messed up

[skilly56]

My comment below about Dead Man buttons has reminded me of an incident that happened when I asked my engineers to check out the Dead Man System on one of the three near-identical ships we had on a pipelaying contract. The three ships were all fitted with 3 X Cummins QSK60 diesel generators, and two were running at the time this event happened.

My 1st engineer had very good electrical knowledge, and he powered up the system, then checked all the DM button boxes to ensure the circuits had energised. Unfortunately (or, maybe fortunately - depends on how one looks at it!), he decided to press the big red DM button located on the bulkhead at the rear of the engine room. There was a hell of a graunching noise, then momentary silence, then one almighty bang as a heavy Ingersoll Rand starter motor hit the control room bulkhead outside, right beside where I was standing inside! It then dropped to the deck with another loud bang!

Once everyone had checked their nickers, we slowly deduced what had happened. Pressing the DM button had opened the air start solenoid valve on No.2 Generator, which happened to be on full load (2,500 kW or thereabouts, at 1800 rpm) at the time. The air start motor tried to engage with the ring gear, but only partially succeeded before the mounting bolts fractured and the entire assemble had been launched over the top of No.3 Generator, before it hit the bulkhead about 6-feet up, beside where I was standing!

We dare not stop the generator as we had no spare air start motor, and the ring gear was a bit stuffed in places. I didn't take the attached photos until we reached port 2 weeks later and the machine could be stopped.

The ring gear also had a crack in it, so the 5.8-tonne generator had to be removed before the ring gear could be replaced on the engine flywheel. We also had to remove the 5.8-tonne generator on the next door No.3 Genset first, to give us room to remove the No.2 generator from No.2 Genset. We decided this Dead Man button had been wired up to create dead men, not keep the engineer awake! The system had obviously never been tested on sea trials test schedules (and the ship was less than a year old!), but it was built in China!

Photo 01 - The damaged ring gear.
Photo 02 - The damaged starter motor pinion.
Photo 03 - 5.8-tonne generator to be shifted.
Photo 04 - 7.5 ft high Cummins QSK60i
Photo 05 - My bridge window - it shattered in the mid-summer tropical heat one day. There was not enough allowance in the window
                framing to allow for heat expansion, so it gave up and broke itself! It was 8-foot high x 4-foot wide, and took nearly 2
                months for a replacement to arrive. I had to breathe on the master's right ear all during that time while I drove my 250-
                tonne winches while looking through his window! Thereafter it was called the Chinese S.E.W.! (Self-Exploding-Window!)

[Chris Thompson]

My bridge window - it shattered in the mid-summer tropical heat one day.

Whilst I was working on the old Discovery Sun out of Ft Lauderdale we had a large window in the Casino shatter like that, went off with a heck of a BANG! Mind you it was about 98 F outside and the AC was blasting at about 60, I must say that old ship had the best AC I've ever experienced.....

[Chris Thompson]

From a News article regarding the car carrier that caught fire....

If anyone with a deep sea submersible is shopping for a flood-damaged car, we know where you can find a few.
The manifest for the Felicity Ace cargo ship that caught fire and sank in the Atlantic Ocean off the Azores islands in March has been posted online, Top Gear first discovered.

Nearly 4,000 vehicles primarily from the Volkswagen Group were onboard when the ship went down in two mile-deep water a few days after the fire and its crew had been rescued without significant injury.
The brands that lost the most vehicles were Audi, Porsche and Volkswagen, but a few rarities were also in the mix, including six Lamborghini Aventador Ultimaes that were among the last of the discontinued model built. This led Lamborghini to restart production to fulfill the orders.

There were also a 2015 Ford Mustang and 2018 Nissan Versa Note being shipped home by members of the U.S. Air Force stationed in Germany and a 1996 Honda Prelude.
According to a Facebook post by the Honda's owner, the Prelude was the 65th of the rare high performance SiR model built that year.
Unfortunately, unlike the automakers who were able to write off the losses of their new vehicles, the Prelude owner said he isn't being compensated due to complications with the insurance coverage, but remains optimistic about getting his hands on one of the cars someday.

"I have chosen to not stress, worry or dwell on that news. I am sad I lost something I was looking forward to for sooo many years. I don't know how I will recover from the expenses lost, time wasted or where I'll find the next SiR, I will find another one to restore no matter what.

The cause of the Felicity Ace fire is still unknown and there are no current plans to try to reach the ship.

[Lynda Bradford]

That's the loss of a lot of cars, and a big insurance claim!

We had a P registration Honda Prelude, but I think it was the model before the one that was lost.  I will look for pictures and information.   

[Chris Thompson]

I love mechanical descriptions for events such as Skilly's Self Exploding Window... This one tickled the funny bone.

On this day: April 7th 1999 – A Boeing KC-135R-BN Stratotanker, 57-1418, c/n 17549, of the 153rd Air Refueling Squadron, Air National Guard, was undergoing maintenance at the Oklahoma ALC, Tinker AFB, Oklahoma, when the cabin was over-pressurized during a test and ruptured, tearing a massive 35 foot hole in the aft fuselage, allowing tail section to commence a self-executed rapid kinetic disassembly, and unceremoniously dropped to the ground.

[June Ingram]

Oh, my.......

[Rod]

Your tax dollars at work!

[skilly56]

Re Chris's flaccid aeroplane- I read the reports going way back.

Turns out contractors had removed the fuselage pressure relief valves from the undercarriage wheel wells, and inserted wooden plugs while they took the valves away for testing, but wrote nothing about the replaced safety devices in the A/C log book. Another contractor then carried out the fuselage pressure testing, but couldn't obtain the correct gear for the job, so, rather than waiting, he inserted a pressure gauge 'from his own kit'! This was an uncalibrated gauge, with no peg to stop the indicator needle from rotating numerous times. Nobody knows how many times the needle went around the clock while the A/C was being pressurised from it's own compressors.
Two aircraft crewmen were aboard while the aircraft was pressurised - after the tail exploded, they emerged from the aircraft with bleeding ears & noses! They were in a position to stop the test at any time, but didn't!

The USAF have kept the reports & photos to help educate others on how 'Not to pressure test the fuselage'!

I used to carry out low-pressure tests like this to test the welds on the fuel & ballast tanks on superyachts we were building. I caught one engineer using his own 'doctored' gauges for these tests. I smashed all his gauges, then dismissed him! He was trying to hide the fact that most of his team couldn't weld properly!
Getting a tick on the test schedule sheet was more important to him than the safety of the ship!

[Chris Thompson]

Wow Skilly, Interesting stuff, kind of worrying that the US Air Force uses subcontractors to maintain their planes. Makes you wonder what’s going on in the civilian air travel industry, although it has apparently been a very safe few years for flying.

[Chris Thompson]

Well good old Carnival are in the news again! This time for a huge punch up in the Disco!

https://www.foxnews.com/us/cruise-ship-brawl-nyc-carnival-coast-guard

When I cruised on Carnival a few years ago (Never Again) I was surprised by the number of security personnel onboard....
now I know why!

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

Not a disaster yet, but one waiting to happen, which the UN is now crowdfunding to prevent. I heard a radio report about this today, but when I searched the Internet, this is the most recent article I was able to find. Plenty of older articles there, warning of the same disaster, even years ago.

https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/04/1115932

The ironically named ship FSO Safer has been abandoned off the coast of Yemen for the past six years. It contains 1.1 million barrels of oil, which would cause a huge environmental disaster, if the ship disintegrated or sank or exploded, any of which could happen any day now.

And here is a more recent update, showing that the UN has managed to raise some funds for the complicated operation needed.

https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/05/1117982

[Trevor Harris]

Well good old Carnival are in the news again! This time for a huge punch up in the Disco!

https://www.foxnews.com/us/cruise-ship-brawl-nyc-carnival-coast-guard

When I cruised on Carnival a few years ago (Never Again) I was surprised by the number of security personnel onboard....
now I know why!

I could never vacation with Carnival. Simply put I find the atmosphere of Carnival ships to be too much like an amusement park. And then of course there's instances like the one you sent to us