Maritime law is, perhaps, at its most dramatic when it comes to ship collisions. Often, "ship collision" refers to one ship hitting another ship. Other times, however, it refers to ships hitting inanimate objects, e.g. piers, the shore or even lighthouses. Quite recently, a small bulk goods hauler under management by a company based in Cuxhaven had a serious accident off the United Kingdom coast which saw it crash headlong into Longstone Island. Technically, this is a "grounding", but the lessons we can learn here are applicable to collisions as well.

Any captain would cringe at the prospect of being responsible for such an accident. But brace yourself and keep reading - after all, it is better to learn from other people's mistakes than to make one's own. The report issued by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) of the United Kingdom Department for Transport, in this particular case, offers a wealth of valuable information which could certainly be of use in averting similar future accidents.

In the following, I will discuss general safety deficiencies which contributed to the accident, red flags to avoid in everyday ship management, international and national safety rules and give some more generalized housekeeping advice related to evidence.

Fact Pattern

The vessel, 1,499 GT, 80.25 m long, crew of 6, was travelling from Perth, Scotland to Genk, Belgium with a cargo of lumber, heading 147', speed 8 knots, on 14 March 2013. The last logbook entry was at 01:00 hours, the collision took place at 03:30 hours - i.e. two and a half hours after the chief officer fell asleep on the couch of the ship following an administration of a dose of eye drops. After hitting the rocky shore of Longstone, the master gave the order to set the engines to half astern (i.e. to back up the ship off the island) - when this failed to dislodge the ship from the island, the decision was made to fully ballast the ship to keep it immobile. On 28 March 2013, the ship was salvaged and towed to Blyth.

Safety Management System (SMS) Deficiencies

All in all, the UK Secretary of State's representative's inspection revealed six (6) breaches of the SMS with respect to navigation. We list the individual breaches here as a point of reference:

Minimum safe manning was not provided for, as only one III/4 navigation watch rating was on board;

The magnetic compass was not readable from the conning position;

No tidal stream information was contained in the passage plan;

Navigation records were defective, as logbook positions, chart positions and electronic records did not tally (i.e. add up);

There was defective monitoring of the passage plan, as plot charts and paper charts were only cross-checked every two hours, but also because no visual radar or echo sounder was used to verify positions provided by GPS;

Use of single-handed night time and coastal watch.

Red Flags to Avoid

A "red flag", in English, means "a glaring problem". Avoiding red flags means that glaring problems are being avoided; of course, this can be done honestly, i.e. by not causing the problems to begin with, or dishonestly, i.e. by covering up the problem after the fact.

One red flag is apparent above, namely the navigational records that did not tally.

The MAIB report contained the following truly ridiculous additional red flag: