[QUOTE=Roguewave50;179825]_____________________________________________________________________________________________
It was revealed during the Coast Guard Hearings in Jacksonville on Sat Feb 20[SUP]th[/SUP], that the stability criteria used by the shore side load planner and onboard by the chief mate was to achieve a still water GM Margin of 0.5 feet (6 inches).
This is dangerously misleading.
What should be done is to run a loading and stability program that both predicts and measures the energy transferred into the ship from wind and waves.[/QUOTE]
I noticed some confusion at the hearing over the term “GM Margin”. Just to state the obvious but GM Margin is the actual GM minus the required GM from the stability book. So if the GM was say 3.8 feet and the required GM was 3.3 feet, they would have a GM Margin of 0.5 feet. 0.5 feet when you talk about GM sounds much scarier than 3.8 feet.
The wave closeness contours on the South and West side of the system are incredible. It definitely shows that anyone on that area wouldn’t exactly perceive an immediate problem. Until something goes wrong of course, which it did.
[QUOTE=Mat;179830][B]“Lawrence said that after the call, his office charted the course of the storm along with the ship’s last known coordinates. Only then did he realize Joaquin was bearing down on the El Faro.”[/B] from the CBS report of the hearing.
I find it hard to believe that if your vessel is known to be steaming close to a hurricane, you wouldn’t have been monitoring its progress relative to the storm constantly. Wouldn’t that be part of your job? Just in case there was an incident of some kind. Why wasn’t that fact picked up on? Likewise, shouldn’t the Coastguard officer on the phone be a little quicker off the mark? If the vessel is disabled very close to an approaching storm that is surely an immediate distress situation. I remember from the Bounty incident how as soon as he heard that the Bounty was in trouble, the Coastguard ops officer was immediately surprised that any vessel was out in that location during a hurricane. He was aware of the storm and was instantly able to place the ship’s location as being hazardous. Why wasn’t that awareness as apparent in the El Faro incident?
Also, although the Master’s use of the phrase “navigational incident” might appear odd, a breach of the hull, loss of hull integrity or swamping can be classed as such.[/QUOTE]
It’s been reported the Davidson dotted his i’s etc so it makes sense that he would use the proper term from the book.
With regards to the office awareness of the weather my experience is they really do expect the captain to deal with it and it’s pretty much off the radar unless it effects the ETA. If they see your running behind they’ll ask for wx conditions. If I need assistance I go straight to the wx routers and just cc the office on the email.
The exception is if the weather is heavy in the media which I think explains why everyone knew about Sandy which was getting saturation coverage. I’ve gotten emails from the arrival agent in the case of the arrival port is going to get hit with a typhoon but otherwise not too much.
I donot know whether in for example JAX the container weights listed on the cargo plans are ever verified. Worldwide in a lot of ports this is not the case and as a result sailing GM is always lower than calculated GM. While requiring additional GM margin is necessary for safe stability, it does not address the issue of overweight boxes in upper tiers.
In naval architecture there is also something like a ‘growth margin’ for older ships. This is an additional margin added into vessel weight calculation to cover for later weight increases. Practically all ships get heavier when they age; this is due to conversions, modifications, painting, etc. and without preparing for this, the ship can later end up with stability problems, requiring a ducktail or a sponson. All the material and pipes brought on board the El Faro to be installed by the Polish workforce is a small example of this phenomenon. I have no idea what the negative effect on the GM really is, but surely it is there.
[QUOTE=Fraqrat;179400]Exactly and they are going for the character assassination on the master with the quickness. If they had doubts about his leadership why was he still commanding their ship?[/QUOTE]
that all comes from the top … “Saltchuk” (s) lawyers are behind the curtains,pulling the levers.
[QUOTE=Dutchie;179837]I donot know whether in for example JAX the container weights listed on the cargo plans are ever verified. Worldwide in a lot of ports this is not the case and as a result sailing GM is always lower than calculated GM. While requiring additional GM margin is necessary for safe stability, it does not address the issue of overweight boxes in upper tiers.
In naval architecture there is also something like a ‘growth margin’ for older ships. This is an additional margin added into vessel weight calculation to cover for later weight increases. Practically all ships get heavier when they age; this is due to conversions, modifications, painting, etc. and without preparing for this, the ship can later end up with stability problems, requiring a ducktail or a sponson. All the material and pipes brought on board the El Faro to be installed by the Polish workforce is a small example of this phenomenon. I have no idea what the negative effect on the GM really is, but surely it is there.[/QUOTE]
After 40 years there would have been a lot of “nice to have”/“too good to throw” items in store rooms and hidden places. Even though the vessel must have had a DW Survey and inclination experience at time of lengthening, this could amount to quite a lot of weight, some of it high up.
Not directly comparable, but after the Alexander Kielland capsized in 1980 every mobile rig working in Norway, or flying Norwegian flag, had to undergo a new DW Survey and inclination. I was involved with a few of them.
A “rule of thumb” quickly emerged; Additional weight not accounted for = 50 m.t./year of age.
Most floaters lost 5-800 m.t. off their deckload capacity. (Mostly because of stricter rules enforced by NMD and DNV)
As a result sponsons and extra columns were added to nearly all Aker H3 rigs.
In fact, Davidson told Lawrence he was not sending the crew to the lifeboats and he was pumping out holds that had flooded. Lawrence called the US Coast Guard, but he did not say the ship was sinking because both Davidson and the second mate seemed calm and in control of the situation. Lawrence thought Davidson would right the ship’s list, regain his engines and steam forward in waves described only as “10–12-foot” (3–3.7 m) swell.
this brings up a troubling tendency of people in positions of responsibility downplaying the severity of a bad situation when they are implicated in creating the circumstances. I have seen this time and time again with some person reporting a situation isn’t all that bad and not to worry to a boss in the hope that the responsible person will somehow be able to fix things before the boss finds out what a mess the whatever is in and that the responsible person might get away clean. I even admit to having done this to some extent myself but never where the stakes were life and death…I have been extremely fortunate to never have been faced such a situation with my ship where a coin flip decided we’d make it or we wouldn’t…doesn’t mean I wasn’t on the razor’s edge of that either and that tall, thin man wearing the all black suit was waiting in the background with his $20 gold piece at the ready. One of GALAXY’s engines dying that night and the man would have stepped forward out of the shadows with the coin asking me heads we die or tales we die or the other way round? I pray I go through my career and life never once having to issue a distress call.
I am very confused tonight if I am to continue to believe that TOTE is the root cause culprit here if in fact it is Davidson thinking all along he’d get that damned ship to San Juan on schedule storm or no storm and that TOTE was simply asleep at the switch and oblivious to the potentially fatal danger their master was delivering their ship into?
[QUOTE=ombugge;179842]After 40 years there would have been a lot of “nice to have”/“too good to throw” items in store rooms and hidden places. Even though the vessel must have had a DW Survey and inclination experience at time of lengthening, this could amount to quite a lot of weight, some of it high up.
Not directly comparable, but after the Alexander Kielland capsized in 1980 every mobile rig working in Norway, or flying Norwegian flag, had to undergo a new DW Survey and inclination. I was involved with a few of them.
A “rule of thumb” quickly emerged; Additional weight not accounted for = 50 m.t./year of age.
Most floaters lost 5-800 m.t. off their deckload capacity. (Mostly because of stricter rules enforced by NMD and DNV)
As a result sponsons and extra columns were added to nearly all Aker H3 rigs.[/QUOTE]
there should be a rule that every 5th year a loadline goes down and KG margin goes up for every vessel at the time of the special survey and where the change in % is much more in the later years of a ship’s life. like 5% for each of the first three special surveys, then 10% for #4 and 15% for #5. After 30 years in service a ship will only legally be able to carry 1/2 its original cargo deadweight and no longer be economical to operate thus going to the breakers at an appropriate time.
[QUOTE=c.captain;179843]I am very confused tonight if I am to continue to believe that TOTE is the root cause culprit here if in fact it is Davidson thinking all along he’d get that damned ship to San Juan on schedule storm or no storm[/QUOTE]
I would imagine if that was his mentality it was caused by the company. Maybe they bitched him out for detouring for Erika and he hoped if he made it on time with that hurricane it would still get him the new ship. We don’t know but I doubt he gave a rat’s ass about the schedule for personal reasons like pride or ego.
They do that after the fact, after the sheep has been drowned. I suppose it does look a bit stupid now, obviously they are making up for an error. They should have done this already ten years ago. For the whole article click here.
In the mean time the transcripts of the telephone conversations have become available. The conversation with the call center is downright appalling. I suspect that if he had started yelling at her to cut out the crap and to put him through on the double she probably would have disconnected him. Under normal circumstances a ship’s master has the direct telephone numbers of key personnel in the nautical departement which, if deemed necessary, they can call 24/7. Who needs a QI under those circumstances? Sending out a distress call was the proper action to take in this case as it would have reflected the actual situation. No mention of an approaching nearby hurricane was made. Why should you downplay it all, what’s the use? It really is mind boggling…
[QUOTE=Dutchie;179853]They do that after the fact, after the sheep has been drowned. I suppose it does look a bit stupid now, obviously they are making up for an error. They should have done this already ten years ago. For the whole article click here.
[/QUOTE]
doesnt look stupid at all, their new targeting method identified a vessel for extra scrutiny which sank, somewhat validating their model. Now if they can prepare the list quicker, maybe they can make progress.
[QUOTE=ombugge;179842]After 40 years there would have been a lot of “nice to have”/“too good to throw” items in store rooms and hidden places. Even though the vessel must have had a DW Survey and inclination experience at time of lengthening, this could amount to quite a lot of weight, some of it high up.
Not directly comparable, but after the Alexander Kielland capsized in 1980 every mobile rig working in Norway, or flying Norwegian flag, had to undergo a new DW Survey and inclination. I was involved with a few of them.
A “rule of thumb” quickly emerged; Additional weight not accounted for = 50 m.t./year of age.
Most floaters lost 5-800 m.t. off their deckload capacity. (Mostly because of stricter rules enforced by NMD and DNV)
As a result sponsons and extra columns were added to nearly all Aker H3 rigs.[/QUOTE]
Years ago, I was involved in an incline experiment on a semi in an attempt to increase its variable load. It was an older semi, I think about 15 years old at the time. When we were finished, they had to decrease their variable load based upon the findings. Oops.
[QUOTE=RespectMyAuthority;179834]I noticed some confusion at the hearing over the term “GM Margin”. Just to state the obvious but GM Margin is the actual GM minus the required GM from the stability book. So if the GM was say 3.8 feet and the required GM was 3.3 feet, they would have a GM Margin of 0.5 feet. 0.5 feet when you talk about GM sounds much scarier than 3.8 feet.[/QUOTE]
At sea there is an energy transfer into and out of the ship.
This results in an imbalance between righting energy and exciting energy when the ship’s motions are out of sync with the wind and wave action.
So evaluating stability with a GM Margin at the dock [U]ignores the dynamics[/U] that are at play at sea.
There is software on the market that allows load planners ashore and mates onboard to gain a far more realistic knowledge of stability in forecasted wind and wave conditions.
Once at sea, the stability sensor gives the actual remaining righting energy, instantaneously and historically over the past hour.
Sensed stability trends give the mate/captain the critical data on which to base their corrective actions.
[QUOTE=Capt. Phoenix;179851]I would imagine if that was his mentality it was caused by the company. Maybe they bitched him out for detouring for Erika and he hoped if he made it on time with that hurricane it would still get him the new ship. We don’t know but I doubt he gave a rat’s ass about the schedule for personal reasons like pride or ego.[/QUOTE]
If you play poker for a living you have to “know when to hold them and know when to fold 'em” as the song says. If a successful player folds, lesser mortals are not going to question the decision. However a player losing money, at some point people may start to question decisions.
It’s the same between the company and captain (or the chief). Things need to get done but nobody wants unnecessary risks. It’s a matter of judging the risk and making sure the ship and crew are up to the task. As long as the company has confidence the captain is judging correctly they will not question decisons. It’s a matter of trust and it’s not worth the compnay’s time and effort to mico-manage. On the other hand if the captain falls on the wrong side of the confidence curve the may start to question almost every delay.
[QUOTE=Dutchie;179853]They do that after the fact, after the sheep has been drowned. I suppose it does look a bit stupid now, obviously they are making up for an error. They should have done this already ten years ago. For the whole article click here.
In the mean time the transcript of the telephone conversations have become available. The conversation with the call center is downright appalling. I suspect that if he had started yelling at her to cut out the crap and to put him through on the double she probably would have disconnected him. Under normal circumstances a ship’s master has the direct telephone numbers of key personnel in the nautical departement which, if deemed necessary, they can call 24/7. Who needs a QI under those circumstances? Sending out a distress call was the proper action to take in this case as it would have reflected the actual situation. No mention of an approaching nearby hurricane was made. Why should you downplay it all, what’s the use? It really is mind boggling…[/QUOTE]
Is Capt. Lawrence both the DPA and the QI? Seems Davidson wanted to talk to him urgently for some reason and tried two different paths to reach him. I won’t put too much weight on these recording as Davidson likely expected to talk directly with Lawrence soon.
[QUOTE=Capt. Phoenix;179851]I would imagine if that was his mentality it was caused by the company. Maybe they bitched him out for detouring for Erika and he hoped if he made it on time with that hurricane it would still get him the new ship. We don’t know but I doubt he gave a rat’s ass about the schedule for personal reasons like pride or ego.[/QUOTE]
why IN THE NAME OF OUR MOST HOLY GOD did Davidson not pull back during the night when it was becoming obvious Joachim was continuing to move SW and was likely going to intersect the EL FARO? By then he had plenty to tell TOTE that he had tried but that he simply could not make it past the storm clear and that for the sake of the ship he was going into a holding pattern until Joachim was no longer a danger. The man had more than 30 years at sea, certainly he had to know there was potentially grave danger to the ship, cargo and her people in challenging the storm head on like he did? Could he have been obtuse to that danger? Would nobody aboard have voiced their concern to him? We know that he was not seen as an infallible God like figure to his people?
Simply put, it was Davidson who overrode all tenants of safe navigation and seamanship during the night of the 30th when he pressed ahead past San Salvador. If he had done the right thing, then the ship would have survived even if the plant was still lost because they would have far enough away from the center of circulation to not get drawn into it as they were. TOTE is correct when they say that is was just bad luck of the propulsion being lost which killed them all but it was taking the ship to a place where the loss of propulsion could be the end of them that is Davidson’s failure. In the end TOTE is not truly guilty of the loss however, I am still believing they put pressure on Davidson to go that route and very possibly gave him a reason to not heave to when he should have but that does not obviate the master of the ship from exercising his overriding authority in performing his duties which fall under his responsibility!
here are that last 12hours where Davidson failed somehow to see the severity of what he was driving the EL FARO into. He had to have access to see these even if only by weatherfax, Sat C EGC warnings or NavText if he didn’t have the internet. There must have been an endless number of warnings being transmitted to the bridge that evening?
WHY IN THE FUCK DID HE NOT SEE THE DANGER?!? Taking EL FARO past San Salvador took them straight into the worst of the storm! WHY DID HE NOT STOP WHEN HE HAD THE CHANCE!?!
already we see that by 2pm the afternoon of the 30th, the ship likely could have stopped and held where they were. By 5pm they would have to likely need to make distance to the NW after stopping to be out of the worst of it but not that much, by 11pm he would have to have to make 75miles to be out of the hurricane winds. By 2am it was too late, they could never get out of the center of circulation but if they were hove to then I still believe they would have made it. I have to believe the worst of everything occurred during the morning after 2am and I am suspecting that a turn to bring the ship head to seas is what created the conditions where the ship fell into mortal danger. You have to be able to safely come about to pull it off and when as close as the EL FARO was to the center of circulation, the winds and the seas may well be too high for the ship to make it all the way up into the wind. Pinned in the trough rolling heavily, shipping massive amounts of water on deck trying to get control of her again, hopefully out of the trough. I have been in irons before and it’s awful to know you can’t get her to come around and then the difficult process to get out of the trough with control of the heading. You can always try to run as fast as you can downwind and build speed enough to wear around but I wonder if they were too close to the islands to pull that off or if simply the EL FARO did not have the HP and too much windage to even make that work? Doing it that way is very dangerous because the turn had to be made at a high speed. Maybe they tried both but both failed?
[QUOTE=c.captain;179866]here are that last 12hours where Davidson failed somehow to see the severity of what he was driving the EL FARO into. He had to have access to see these even if only by weatherfax, Sat C EGC warnings or NavText if he didn’t have the internet. There must have been an endless number of warnings being transmitted to the bridge that evening?
[B]WHY IN THE FUCK DID HE NOT SEE THE DANGER?!?[/B]
Taking EL FARO past San Salvador took them straight into the worst of the storm! WHY DID HE NOT STOP WHEN HE HAD THE CHANCE!?!
yup, waiting too long to move can be every bit as bad as not moving at all.
somehow, I am beginning to believe that Davidson never really acquired any heavy weather sailing experience (at least not as a master) to make such a rookie mistake.
