US Congress to pass new passenger vessel safety regulations

The US Congress will pass new passenger vessel safety regulations aiming to improve the current regulations, following the disastrous incident when the Conception dive boat caught fire in September 2019, one of the worst maritime casualties in the United States in recent memory.

Accordingly, Senator Dianne Feinstein and representatives announced that the bill on fire safety – the Small Passenger Vessel Safety Act – has been rolled into the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2021.

Feinstein’s amendment would require the Secretary of Transportation to formulate new fire safety requirements for small passenger vessels under 100 GT. All are directly targeted at deficiencies identified by an NTSB investigation into the Conception fire, and they include:

• the addition of interconnected fire detection, protection, and suppression equipment in all areas on board where passengers have access;
• requirements to increase fire detection, protection, and suppression systems in unmanned machinery areas;
• requirements for two or more avenues of escape from all common areas for passengers, arranged so that they may not both be blocked in an emergency;
• increased marine firefighting training for small passenger vessel crew;
• new rules for the handling of lithium ion batteries and other flammables on small passenger vessels;
• extending safety management system (SMS) requirements to cover small passenger vessel operations.

To explain, the NDAA is an 1,800-page omnibus defense bill that authorizes spending for servicemember pay, weapons programs, and a wide array of non-defense policy measures incorporated as amendments. It has passed every year for the last 59 years, and the House and Senate have agreed on this year’s final version.

In light of the changes, one of the representatives, Representative Salud Carbajal (D-CA) commented that

My thoughts continue to be with those who lost a loved one in the Conception boat fire. It was a preventable tragedy and, as legislators, we knew we needed to act right away to prevent future loss of life.