As UK MAIB reports in its most recent Safety Digest, it was a fine mid-summer’s day with light airs when a bulk carrier picked up its pilot to negotiate the lock gates and berth at a tidally constrained harbour.
The incident
The ship was running behind schedule and the pilot and the master discussed the pilotage plan before settling on a direct course towards the lock entrance. Having just missed high water, the ebb stream was already flowing across the approaches to the lock, pushing the ship to starboard of its approach track. The bulk carrier grounded on a shoal near the port entrance.
The pilot and master took rapid action to apply lots of stern power and managed to free the bulk carrier from the shoal after 20 minutes. The ship had turned back into the main channel and, with the tide falling quickly and the ebb stream strengthening, the pilot and master decided to make a second approach. However, having made a very tight turn off the harbour entrance the bulk carrier again missed the approach and rounded for a second time on the same shoal. The ship had to wait until the next high tide to float off and eventually berthed 12.5 hours later than originally planned. The bulk carrier was undamaged but received a detention notice after a port state inspection, which delayed its departure.
Lessons learned
- Plan: Tides do not bend to the will of mariners and accommodate their schedules. Given that the pilot and master had missed the predicted high water time by 16 minutes, the first attempt into the harbour already posed a challenge while the second attempt, some 40 minutes later, was optimistic. It is often best to
wait for the right conditions, regardless of operational pressures. - Communicate: After the accident it emerged that neither the master nor the pilot was happy with the attempted port entry. However, they did not broach the subject with one another or question the plan. The International Chamber of Shipping Bridge Procedures Guide, Sixth Edition, provides advice on leadership, challenge and response and thinking aloud to best practice operations on board. Talking about the tides and environmental conditions as part of a thinking aloud exercise can enable good decisions to be made and ensure that all are aware of the risks.
- Hazard: The shoal at the harbour entrance was charted and recognised as a hazard on the ship’s pilotage plan. However, it appears that everyone had become accustomed to the risk it presented. Dredging is not always the right answer and so for each act of pilotage it is vital to ensure that there is positive acknowledgement of the conditions, which will differ each time. In this case, the winds were light and did not counter the effect of the strong ebb stream.
