Don’t worry, be happy is a good rule to live by:
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This trip might be on a 70 day time charter, but I think she’s long term chartered to Crowley for a while.
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When studying for the Master Mariner exam my class sat in on an enquire about a collision between two fishing boats in the middle of the North Sea.
One of the boats were drifting while the crew was getting some rest. One fisherman was on watch in the wheelhouse. Only one white all-round signal light showing.
The other was returning to the fishing grounds after delivery last catch in Norway.
The “Bestmann” (Mate) had been called home for a family emergency and an experienced fishermen was standing in for him for one trip. This was allowed for a boat of this type and size. Or so the Skipper believed.(Only for return to safe port)
The temp. “Bestmann” testified that he had seen a white light and “20 min. later we hit the white light”. The drfinh boat sunk, but all the crew was picked up by the second boat.
Clear cut case, we thought; one boat drifting and got rammed by the other one in clear weather.
Not so. The blame was divided 80/20, because the drifting vessel did not show correct signals for a vessel not under command, nor did anything to signal the approaching vessel.
PS> Both boats originated from the same island, (Remøy) and nearly the entire crew on both vessels had the surname “Remøy”. Some even had the same first name, which cause some confusion. (The middle name initial was used to identify them)
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I have little doubt there will be a split of fault here to some degree. Even the most clear cut cases of negligence have contributing factors on the other side.
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I am betting 90/10 split or about in this case. Guessing the Solong OOW/master was sleeping.
Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by an overworked 3rd world mong whose career went from enjoyable and fulfilling to miserable abject drudgery in just 20 short years.
That the Master on MV Solong was Russian is not a main issue here, as long as he was qualified per IMO STCW. (+ Sober and awake, if he was OOW at the time)
BTW;The crew onboard Solong was Russian and Pinoy.
It doesn’t appears that ships with “1st world” Master, officers and crews has any less accidents than others, relative to the number of ships involved in accidents every year.
Although the relative number of maritime accidents is dropping, those caused by human error still accounts for a large %:
Qualification and training IS a major factor, while nationality is NOT automatically a proof, one way or the other.
PS> Not sure were this “3rd world” is anymore.
I think the idea of Russian nationality is the idea of sabotage, an intentional collision (given the the American vessel falls into a qausi military category). Sure, that’s a bit “conspiracy theorist”, but hey.
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Those other identical track line runs musta been practice runs while they waited for their target to come line up for them.
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Man what forethought and planning! It’s like they knew that sometime in the next month or two a US flag ship carrying military cargo would happen to park right in their target zone.
Perfect execution. 10/10.
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Gotta hand it to em
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You bet they were. And since all chinese built products ( ships & gantry cranes included) are saturated heavily with spying / monitoring and other fancy hidden squawking devices they intercepted the American target straight like an arrow.
I have never heard a bell or gong from a ship in my life, but on foggy nights sometimes I have a hard time getting to sleep with all the loud foghorns going in the anchorage, so they do have those!
Been kind of keeping out of this one until the tin foil hat brigade give up.
Apart from someone who has never heard a fog signal the lunatics have largely left the asylum.
Feeder container ships are and have been for a good long time now a disaster waiting to happen. It hasn’t just happened it’s been happening for years.
These poor bastard’s who drive these things are absolutely exhausted. I don’t know how much they get paid but it’s waay not enough.
We did a survey some years ago about bridge standards and by far at the bottom were feeder container ships. The guys were just knackered.
When it’s cheaper to move a ship than hire a few trucks something is seriously wrong with an industry. These ships shift sometimes 3 times or more during a port stay as it’s cheaper to move the ship than hire a few more trucks.
Add on the constant crashing and heeling during the cargo operations even when they have a chance to rest.
Another thing no one has mentioned or even thought about is the horrendous noise from the CPP propeller driving right underneath the accommodation block that makes is difficult to even have a conversation on the bridge without shouting. Can you imagine living like this for weeks on end.
Jeez I did experience something like this on OSVs in the north sea but at least when it was foggy/calm when we were on passage it was quiet.
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PS> According to the broadcast news he is in custody and will appear before a magistrate court in London 14. April.
Lost me @ horrendous noise from CPP propeller 
You must have super human ears to hear the prop from the accomodation
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Try to examine all post delivered here by SIR @244 and You will surely come to the only conclusion , He most certainly is in all possible respects 
superhuman.
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I would agree the engine noise/propeller/vibration on a container feeder is on a different level to most ships and is not conducive to a good sleep and neither when working cargo.
It will be interesting to see what the watch pattern, previous working hours and length of time onboard of the watch keeper at the time of the incident.
I do think there is no excuse for the collision but it will be interesting to see what the contributory factors were.
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I don’t think many of the small feeder vessels come with DNV Comf-V notation: