Skipper of capsized cargo ship 'probably felt pressure to keep sailing

....κάτι μαύρο μου θυμίζει αυτό το ναυάγιο, και μάλιστα γιορτινές μέρες.

Πόσο πολύ μπορεί να μοιάζουν μεταξύ τους, ακόμα και τα ναυάγια?? ναι , όταν υπάρχει ο παράγων άνθρωπος στην μέση.... πόσα χρόνια μετά , από αφάνταστα ναυάγια τσιμεντάδικων και αυτός ο καπετάνιος δεν είχε διδαχθεί  κάτι??  Έγιναν όλα τόσο γρήγορα, που δεν πρόλαβαν καν, να πατήσουν ένα κουμπί για βοήθεια, Τώρα να πούμε ότι και τα πολλά excemptions,  δεν είναι για το καλό του πλοίου, αλλά όπως και να έχουν τα πράγματα, ο Πλοίαρχος έχει τον τελευταίο λόγο επάνω στο πλοίο, αλλά ποτέ ένα λόγο μια αιτία που να τους στείλει αδιάβαστους....

Inquiry finds sinking of Cemfjord with loss of eight lives in Pentland Firth was entirely avoidable

 Cemfjord did not issue a distress signal and the incident only came to light when its prow was seen above the waves.

Severin Carrell Scotland editor

Thursday 21 April 2016 10.23 BSTLast modified on Thursday 21 April 201613.39 BST

The skipper of a cargo ship that sank with the loss of eight lives during a severe storm in dangerous waters was very likely to have felt under commercial pressure to continue sailing, an inquiry has found.

The Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) said the sinking of the Cemfjord cargo ship in the Pentland Firth between Orkney and the Scottish mainland, during “extraordinarily violent sea conditions” in January 2015, was entirely avoidable.

The Pentland Firth is widely recognised as one of the world’s most treacherous channels, particularly in winter, since it joins the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea, leading to powerful tidal forces.

The Cypriot-registered vessel, carrying a cargo of cement from Aalborg in Denmark to Runcorn in Cheshire, capsized suddenly without having issued a distress signal. All its crew, seven Poles and one Filipino mariner, were lost and none of their bodies recovered despite an extensive search operation.

The incident only came to light when a passing ferry spotted its prow poking vertically above the waves, 24 hours after the ship had last been seen, partly because the ship’s owners did not routinely monitor daily updates from its vessels during holidays.

In a highly critical report, the MAIB concluded that the decision by Pawel Chruscinski, the skipper, not to seek shelter from the storm “was almost certainly a result of poor passage-planning, an underestimation of the severity of the conditions and perceived or actual commercial pressure to press ahead with the voyage.

“Critically, this decision will also have been underpinned by an unwillingness to alter course across the heavy seas after the experience of a cement cargo shift in similar circumstances about three months before the accident.

“The appalling conditions and rapid nature of the capsize denied the crew an opportunity to issue a distress message or to escape from their ship.”

The MAIB also urged the Maritime and Coastguard Agency to reconsider its refusal to make a voluntary reporting system for cargo vessels on the Pentland Firth compulsory. It should also consider a new local warning system for skippers “given the frequent and extreme local sea conditions”.

It added that the vessel was at sea with “significant safety deficiencies relating to its rescue boat launching arrangements and bilge pumping system in the void spaces beneath the cement cargo holds”. Those had been authorised by the Cypriots – a system criticised and challenged by the MAIB.

The owner of the vessel, the Hamburg-based firm Brise Breederungs, said responsibility for routing decisions lay with a ship’s skipper or master, and the charterer of the ship, in this case the cement firm Aalborg Portland.

In a statement, Brise Breederungs said: “We wish to express, once again, our condolences to the families of those who lost their lives.” It added: “We will never know the exact basis on which [the skipper] took this decision.”

A Brise Breederungs spokesman said: “The commercial consequences of a voyage are a matter for the charterer. As far as Brise is concerned, the master is in a command position and he has every right, and is indeed encouraged, to use his professional judgment to decide, for example, to take a northerly route to Runcorn or take a southerly route in cases of bad weather.”

Aalborg Portland dispute that account. Peter Boltau, its supply chain management director, said it believed the owners of the Cemfjord would “always remain responsible for the navigation of the vessel, also for any deviations or loss of time caused by e.g. poor weather conditions.”

Boltau added that Aalborg Portland had used that charter company for 10 years. “We had no reason to doubt that the master of the Cemfjord Vessel whom we had cooperated with for many years, would be capable of making the best routing decisions based on close and continuous monitoring of the progress of the vessel and the weather conditions,” Boltau said. 

The MAIB said it had flagged a series of safety concerns it uncovered during its investigation with the ship’s owners and the Cypriot authorities.

It directed Brise, which has since upgraded its accident reporting and weather forecasting systems, to improve training in new stability systems and cargo management for ship commanders, and to “take robust measures to improve the safety culture on board its vessels and within the company as a whole”.

The Cypriots were asked to review their processes for allowing flagged vessels to have exemptions. The MAIB said the exemptions granted by the Cypriots were not applicable to the Cemfjord’s equipment. But there were misunderstandings about that involving the firms involved and the Cypriots.

“The [Cypriot] process for managing requests for exemptions from international safety regulations was also found to lack rigour,” the MAIB found. “Additionally, [its] inspections of the vessel over many years in Poland were ineffective and did not deliver the intended levels of assurance.”