CHIRP issued its 56th Maritime Feedback focusing on reports discussing the impacts of fatigue and the importance of seafarers’ wellbeing when onboard. Managing stress and sleeping well at sea is an integral part of positive health and well-being on board, given that fatigue is a leading factor in accidents.
[In March, the IMO issued its updated fatigue guidelines, which firstly approved during the 100th session of its Maritime Safety Committee (MSC 100).]
A report sent to CHIPR focused on a near miss accident when a large cruise vessel was entering the port. During the vessel’s arrival to the inward channel, the vessel’s port stabilizer didn’t work.
Therefore, acknowledging the severity of the situation and the potential risks if the vessel entered the port, the vessel aborted the entry to solve the issue. The engineers onboard the vessel solve the problem and managed to house the port stabilizer by manually overriding the automatic system, after a delay of about 30 minutes. The vessel then recommenced port entry with no further issues.
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In light of this incident, the Maritime Advisory Board members concluded to the following:
- This could have been a serious incident with very expensive consequences.
- The ER/Bridge communications were good on this ship.
- The ship’s operating procedures worked.
- If there is any suspicion that an automatic system may have malfunctioned it is essential that the personnel responsible for the equipment or system carry out whatever checks are necessary to positively confirm the actual status of the equipment and to rectify any defect.
- Safety critical systems should be checked and be proven to be operational well ahead of the time they may be needed. Manual override of remote-control systems should also be tested at the same time to ensure that they operate correctly.
From a navigational perspective it is worth noting that the report states that the vessel was on the final approach to the inward channel. The fact that the vessel did abort the inbound transit is a very good indication that the bridge team were well aware of the “final abort position”, where you are fully committed to the port approach, and acted accordingly before it was too late
… CHIRP concluded.
To explore more, click on the PDF herebelow
