Capt. Yuehui Zhang explores how routine familiarity can gradually replace active verification during shipboard operations, using the Heilan Star explosion as a case study to examine the human factors behind the accident. It also discusses several practical lessons that may help strengthen safety awareness in everyday maritime operations.
The explosion was triggered by a welding arc. The accident began much earlier. What failed was not the equipment, but the judgement that had already concluded the risk to be acceptable long before the first welding arc was struck.