I don’t want to be harsh but why do we need dissertations and studies to show that what is needed is simply following the COLREGS as well as maintaining a proper lookout and bridge to bridge communications? Why does the simple have to be made complicated?
If everyone in charge on all ships concerned has proper training and experience and knows the proper way to conn a ship in congested waters there should be no need to dissect this. The COLREGS have minutia in them which is hell for testing but the basic rules are not complex. As long as the rules are understood and followed collisions wouldn’t occur. This is especially true where speed is concerned. In taking off speed aboard all vessels in meeting, collisions are virtually eliminated or at least the damage resulting from one drops to scratched paint as opposed to sinking.
I do not know yet how much speed played a factor in the collision which just happened in the Houston Ship Channel but I bet it did. Both vessels tried to maneuver out of it when I well imagine if both had ordered a crash stop, there might not have been any collision at all.