Show me a transportation sector where the driver/pilot/skipper is not required to keep maintain a tight schedule. Show me a driver/pilot/skipper that isn’t worried about losing his/her job if a schedule isn’t kept. It’s a capitalist world. Did Captain Davidson feel more pressure than any other captain? Has TOTE fired other captains for not maintaining schedules because of weather? Can the NTSB interview other captains on similar routes, in private, to see if there is a history of extraordinary pressure being put on them? There are legitimate lines of inquiry. Lots on innuendo on the subject. In a hypothetical sense, does that mean company officials should be off the hook for applying undue pressure? No, but extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
I side with those people who say the captain has the ultimate responsibility. He or she is paid to make tough decisions, and must suffer the consequences for those decisions. It is unfair, yes. The people in the office don’t have that sort of pressure thrust on them, true. But I really can’t see how the system can work otherwise.
If there was no pressure on drivers/pilots/skippers to maintain schedules, schedules would not be kept. Simple human nature. Imagine a world where schedules weren’t kept. All sorts of forum-writers would lather at the mouth about how no one in the USA can keep schedules any more, and how planes are always delayed in flying or arriving, and how their package took too long to get to their house, or how the lousy cable guy was 2 hours late…
Pressure to keep schedules has always been a part of a sailor’s life. Time and tide wait for no man. The invention of the railroads and telegraphs in the first part of the 19th century just made it worse. As long as we get our stuff on time, and our asses at the hotel on time, we don’t complain about some poor bastard sweating it out to make our life “richer”. But when we’re the poor slob maintaining the schedules it’s the crime of the century apparently, filled with John Grisham subplots.
By the way—“jury tampering”? A serious charge by a poster. If you truly believe it, gather names and facts and pass them on the appropriate prosecutor. If they take no action then we have a legitimate gripe.
From a guy who regularly watches 260’ boats cross the Gulf of Alaska on a strict 24-day SCHEDULE, year round, some observations:
Weather forecasting software works. Haven’t read—did El Faro have any? If so, why not followed? (Rhetorical question now, I know).
Organizations (captains and companies both) who routinely operate in areas where hurricane force winds/ 40 foot seas/icing are a common occurrence think in terms of delaying sailings, weather courses, and making use of ports of refuge early and often. Being on a 260’ long ship in 40 foots seas is no fun, but if that’s the world you live in, you have a completely different mindset than a person in more benign seas. You respect the heavy weather just as much, you fear it just as much, but you become adept at working around it. It’s part of the skill set of being a captain, and the Home office realizes that slowdowns will occur when the weather goes to Hell, because it seemingly always go to Hell. Expectations are set accordingly.
I am going to go out on a limb here and suggest that a FRACTION of organizations who routinely operate in more benign seas and on larger ships do not have the same amount of expertise in heavy weather avoidance. That doesn’t make them dumber, or less professional. It’s just a gap in their knowledge base.
(Analogy: I live in Seattle. Snow is rare. When it happens, drivers crash because they can’t drive on snow. People from Minnesota laugh at us. We’re idiots. But we’re not idiots. We just don’t drive on snow that much. No experience, and we are wise to acknowledge there’s a knowledge gap there. Maybe we should go to snow driving school in Duluth. Or maybe we should listen to what Duluth drivers have to teach us. Or maybe we should just agree not to drive when the snow comes down, because we’re not good at it. That last one is an example of a GOOD POLICY. The driver decides he’s going to take the light-rail to work that day because he’s no good at snow driving. The company he works for agrees he will be late to work because everyone is bad at snow driving. Policy, agreed on by all. No drama. )
To avoid accidents caused by a systemic or momentary lack of good judgement on the part of the captain or the company, we create policies. Or standing orders. What were TOTE’s policies in case of severe weather? I would like to read them. Probably very detailed. Maybe not. What were Captain Davidson’s standing orders in case of severe weather? In the strategic sense, not the tactical. I’d like to read them, too, if there’s a copy ashore somewhere. Or perhaps the ORGANIZATION was like a Seattle driver in snow. Competent, careful, but inexperienced in a situation.
I know certain captains are screaming at me for besmirching their considerable expertise. Well, after looking up the word “besmirching”, educate us all on standard severe weather policies on the particular run EL Faro was on. From what I’ve read the standing orders /policies in place in this particular organization settled what to do if there was a problem, not how to avoid the problem in the first case. Namely, how do we ease the inter-company tension between schedule-keeping and ship safety in severe weather?
Here’s my suggestion for a bit of FUTURE policy on that route. Policy for the entire ORGANIZATION, not just the captain:
• Satellite-based weather-routing software should be referred to at all times, and deferred to unless the captain is absolutely sure he has a better plan.
• When operating within X miles of a hurricane track matters of avoiding the hurricane takes priority over schedule. Then the Traffic Department must run interference with the customers, and the CEO make known to the office troops that for the time being it’s not business as usual.
• When operating within x miles of a hurricane track captains should think in terms of ports of refuge or avoidance of worst winds, rather than keeping a schedule.
A final comment:
Let me be honest and state that what I fear from the El Faro investigation is the USCG coming up with a one-size-fits-all plan for dealing with heavy weather that may suit some side of the industry but not the other. As I have said, the vessels I deal with navigate heavy weather and severe conditions a great deal more often than vessels in other trades. Our trade has been in existence for 44 years. We have sailed through innumerable storms and icing situations and have never lost a ship to weather. When I read a poster write, as I did months ago, that ships should never be allowed near storms, I worry. Knee-jerk reactions like that, if listened to by government organizations, could kill the Trade I love, because our environment IS heavy weather. We dislike it, we’re damn good at steering around it,
at times we sail into it and let it pass over us, and still we get back to port, limbs intact and cargo sound, because we know what we’re doing, and get a little better each year at doing it.