A crew’s concern over the safety of rescue boat drills may have saved them from serious injury or even death.
A Danish investigation into the December 2017 rescue boat drill accident on the 31,678-gt passengership Bergensfjord (built 2014) found the crew were so worried about the safety of the drills that they no longer took part in the initial lowering phase during routine practice.
The industry’s long history of fatal accidents caused by the unintended release of life and rescue boats during drills had troubled the crew on the vessel, which is controlled by Fjord Line.
They only participated in such drills after the initial lowering phase had been completed, the release mechanism was shown to be secure and the boat was at a safe height from the sea, according to a report by the Danish Maritime Accident Investigation Board.
“The shipping company and the ship’s crew considered the release of the boat to be associated with significant risk to the rescue boat crew,” the board said.
“The ship’s crew had heard about accidents happening while the rescue [boat] was being lowered, they were generally uneasy about the boat beginning to sway while at height. Therefore ship training exercises contained a practice, where the rescue boat was lowered to a door in the ship’s side from where the crew boarded.”
So when the rescue boat davit did unintentionally release during a statutory Danish and Norwegian flag state test last year, there were no crew in the boat.
The investigation found that as the rescue boat was released from its cradle, the release lever hit the arm of the davit, severing the release pin, and led to the unintended release of the boat. The release lever had also not been set properly.
The report said: “The investigation demonstrated that the cause was a combination of the launching appliance’s design and function, which allowed an unintended release of the rescue boat. The ways in which the crew used the release hook could both allow the incident to happen and had also prevented it from happening before.”
There will be concern that the accident occurred on a ship that was built after IMO initiatives to improve lifeboat safety and release mechanism design.
