LIFELINE April 2011 - English

LIFE LINE

April 2011

December 2010 The Newsletter of the International Maritime Rescue Federation (IMRF) December 2010 News… Experience… Ideas… Information… Development…

December 2010 In this issue: 

December the World Maritime Rescue Congress, the International SAR Exhibition, and the IMRF’s 2010

  

Quadrennial General Meeting - Shanghai, August 2011 news from Sri Lanka, Uruguay, the UK & Ireland, The Gambia, Sweden, and Canada the IMRF’s projects, and its work at the International Maritime Organization and more!

December 2010 December 2010 December 2010 December

This year will see the IMRF‟s quadrennial World Maritime Rescue Congress convene in Shanghai, 2010kindly hosted by China Rescue and Salvage. We introduced the Congress in the December edition of LIFE LINE and gave more details of it in our February edition. There‟s more in this edition too.

December

The Congress is for anyone involved in maritime SAR or in the wider response to emergencies on the 2010 world‟s waters. It will run in parallel with the International Search and Rescue Exhibition - a great opportunity to display and to see the latest in SAR technology and equipment from around the world.

December

Also running in parallel with the Congress will be the IMRF‟s Quadrennial General Meeting. This is our 2010 Trustees‟ opportunity to report to the Member organisations on the significant progress which the IMRF has made over the past four years; and the Member organisations‟ opportunity to discuss and to shape the IMRF‟s plans for the next quadrennial period (2011 to 2015), and to elect the new Board ofDecember Trustees to take over responsibility for the IMRF‟s development and governance during this period.

2010

If you have not already done so, book your place now! visit email phone fax

December 2010

www.wmrc2011/.org

congress2011@international-maritime-rescue.org +86 21 3381 2011 +86 21 3381 2010

December 2010 December 2010 December 2010 December 2010 December page 1 2010 December

LIFE LINE

April 2011

Editorial Welcome to the April 2011 edition of LIFE LINE. As our February edition „went to press‟ news was coming in of the earthquake that did so much damage and cost so many lives in and around Christchurch, New Zealand.

Since then, of course, the world has watched, horrified, the pictures coming from Japan of an even more devastating earthquake, and the awful tsunami which followed it. Huge areas of the country have been laid waste. Thousands of people have died.

But we have watched, too, the extraordinary efforts of the search and rescue services working in the wake of these disasters.

Contents World Maritime Rescue Congress, International SAR Exhibition, and the IMRF Quadrennial General Meeting ....

1

Editorial

2

...........................................

Dates for the Diary

..............................

2

World Maritime Rescue Congress an overview ..............................

3

An IMRF Rescue Boat Code

.................

4

Mass rescue ...........................................

4

News from the Sri Lanka, Uruguay, and the UK & Ireland .................

5

News from The Gambia

6

.................

News from Sweden and Canada

....

7

The IMRF at the IMO ..............................

7

SAR Matters ...........................................

8

The „refreshed‟ IMRF website .................

8

Send us your news & pictures .................

8

Dates for the Diary The rescuers‟ work, on land and at sea, continued even though many of those involved in it had had their own lives torn apart. They turned to their lifesaving work nevertheless.

Their example is both humbling and inspiring.

We wish them, and all who they have been able to save, as speedy a recovery as may be.

In the wake of such disasters, our own efforts in maritime rescue perhaps seem small by comparison. But, in a way, they are not - not to those we have saved. To each of them, theirs was a personal disaster - and the rescue teams work to save them whether or not the world is watching.

There may be something better in the human spirit than the desire to rescue others in distress but, offhand, I cannot think what it might be.

We salute the extraordinary deeds of the men and women responding to the earthquakes on the Pacific Rim; and we salute too the less well-known deeds of everyone who pulls a fellow human being from the world‟s waters.

Which is what the IMRF is about.

I hope you will find the contents of this edition of our newsletter interesting and helpful.

World Maritime Rescue Congress 24-28 Aug 2011 The Congress will be hosted by China Rescue and Salvage in Shanghai. It will comprise presentations, workshops, an international SAR exhibition, and SAR exercises. It will also be the venue for the IMRF Members‟ quadrennial general meeting.

See the articles in this issue of LIFE LINE and visit www.wmrc2011.org for further details.

European Regional Meeting

27-28 Oct 2011

The next IMRF European Regional Development meeting will be hosted in Oslo by the Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue.

More details in due course.

SAR ASIA-2011

6-7 Dec 2011

The first Shephard Group SAR event in the Asia-Pacific region will be held in the Holiday Inn Atrium, Singapore. For programme enquires contact Capt Gabriel Kinney, USCG (retired) at gkinney@twcny.rr.com.

Mass Rescue Conference

June 2012

The second in IMRF‟s conference series on mass rescue at sea will continue work begun in Gothenburg in June 2010 (see report in the October issue of LIFE LINE) and to be progressed at the World Maritime Rescue Congress in Shanghai. Further details will be announced in LIFE LINE in due course.

Best wishes, Dave Jardine-Smith news@internationalmaritime-rescue.org

page 2

LIFE LINE

The World Maritime Rescue Congress 2011 - to be held at the Intercontinental Hotel in Pu Dong, Shanghai, China - continues the long traditions of the International Lifeboat Conferences dating back to 1924.

The 2011 Congress will include: Opening and keynote addresses The International Search and Rescue Exhibition The IMRF Quadrennial General Meeting Syndicate sessions, in which delegates can exchange experiences, ideas, and lessons learned in search and rescue worldwide Workshops on key topics pertinent to international search and rescue Planning sessions identifying future priorities for the global SAR community

April 2011

The focus will very much be on exchanging ideas, developments and lessons learned as well as promoting open discussion among delegates. Two of the main streams of discussion will continue core IMRF work already established at earlier conferences: Large scale („mass‟) rescue operations Developing IMRF guidance on the design and operation of maritime rescue vessels of less than 24m length In addition there will be parallel streams open for topics which the delegates themselves would like to introduce.

If you are part of an IMRF Member organisation, you have the opportunity to select possible subjects from a „topic questionnaire‟, or to propose sessions of your own.

Please make use of this opportunity! This is your Congress; your chance to be heard on the world SAR stage!

Contacts - please see page 1.

page 3

LIFE LINE

April 2011

mass rescue

A Rescue Boat Code The IMRF Code of Practice Working Group continues its hard work on developing international guidelines for the design, equipment and operation of smaller rescue craft. Recent progress has been good, with all the risk assessment activities completed.

There has also been a review of the Code Group‟s work from a lifeguarding point of view, conducted by representatives from six lifeguard organisations. And a meeting has been scheduled to conduct a review of the training output from the Code.

The Group‟s work to date will be one of the main themes of the World Maritime Rescue Congress in Shanghai. Delegates to the Congress will have the opportunity to review in depth the work done so far, and bring their own experience and expertise to bear.

Another major theme at the World Maritime Rescue Congress in August will be the IMRF‟s on-going project on „mass rescue‟. Our aims are to: 

provide an international focus on mass rescue at, or by, sea;



provide a forum for discussion;



identify specific problems which would benefit from further research & development;



identify potential amendments to international regulation and guidance; and



compile and host a dynamic, web-based compendium of practical data on the subject.

In other words: we want to do it better if we have to do it at all.

Overall, the aim of the Code is to provide information and guidance on policies and principles for maritime SAR organisations to adopt, so as to define and improve their operations and to ensure the health and safety of those involved.

The Code will encourage the sharing of knowledge, providing guidelines and recommendations. It will not remove the need for SAR organisations to comply with relevant national authorities‟ requirements. Nor will it apply to large vessels (24 metres length or more) which fall under the requirements of the International Convention on Load Lines.

Above all, the IMRF code will not be prescriptive: it is meant to help, not hinder, the development of SAR services around the world: services ranging from beach lifeguarding to open sea operations.

By international definition, „rescue‟ is the „operation to retrieve persons in distress, provide for their initial medical or other needs and deliver them to a place of safety‟ - and a „mass rescue operation‟ is „characterised by the need for immediate response to large numbers of persons in distress such that the capabilities normally available to the SAR authorities are inadequate‟.

The IMRF have begun a series of specific conferences on mass rescue, and will continue our work in Shanghai. We want to share experience and initiatives so as to improve the response to mass rescue incidents wherever they may occur in the world.

What sort of issues are under discussion? Well, there are many, including the recovery of people from survival craft or from the water; accounting for people, including searches in the midst of mass rescue operations; supporting survivors during their transfer to the „place of safety‟; use of „additional facilities‟; on scene coordination of surface units and aircraft; coordination with shoreside authorities; communications - priorities, systems and structures; on-board support of vessels in distress but not (yet) being abandoned; rescue in remote areas & other special cases; learning from others‟ experience - including survivors‟ - and from our own; mass rescue planning; mass rescue resources (including funding); and training & exercising.

A lot to think about - and we‟re not even sure that this list is complete.

Like to be part of this? Come to the Congress; and/or send any thoughts or comments to the Code Project Manager, Neil Chaplin, at: imrfcode@googlemail.com

In Shanghai there will be presentations, workshops and tabletop exercises on this very important subject, aimed at identifying the weak points of our potential response and seeing what we can do to strengthen them.

Come and join in! Please see the Congress contact details on page 1, or contact Dave Jardine-Smith at d.jardinesmith@international-maritime-rescue.org. page 4

LIFE LINE

News from Sri Lanka The value of an EPIRB - an Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon - is clear.

Properly mounted, it will float free in the event of a boat sinking and will then automatically begin transmission; or it can be set going independently. Its signal is picked up by the satellites of the COSPAS/SARSAT system and relayed to the appropriate rescue coordination centre (RCC) as a distress alert.

Depending on other gear carried, or inputs from the crew, it can also send GPS position data and a code indicating the nature of the distress. Properly registered, it will also allow the RCC staff to identify the vessel it came from. Even without input data, the satellites can pinpoint the beacon‟s position quickly and accurately. It‟s an excellent alerting and location device.

The only difficulties may be being able to afford one, and getting permission from the local radio authorities to carry it.

However, a recent initiative in Sri Lanka has resulted in a number of donated EPIRBs being imported and approved for carriage by „multiday‟ fishing vessels.

An EPIRB is presented to a fishing vessel skipper from Trincomalee.

Two units have been placed at the fishery training schools at Negombo and Tangalle, and another four have been provided for use at sea once the necessary training is complete.

Another initiative has seen donated radar reflectors being fitted to deep-sea fishing vessels off the Sri Lankan west coast.

After all: SAR prevention is even better than SAR cure!

April 2011

News from Uruguay In our February edition we reported the arrival in Uruguay of the Asociación Honoraria de Salvamentos Marítimos y Fluviales (the Honorary Association of Maritime & River Rescue)‟s new lifeboat, the ADES 19.

We are now pleased to hear from Jorge Diena of ADES that the new boat‟s first major task was the rescue of the three crew of the launch Tentacion, north of Colonia de Sacremento during a February storm. And fittingly perhaps - the ADES 19 having begun her rescuing life in the UK one of those rescued was a British citizen.

Thanking ADES for saving his Argentine wife, father-in-law and himself, he wrote: „The manner in which your team quickly found a solution to the dangerous situation in which we found ourselves was extremely impressive. The way you worked together to convey us from the Tentacion to your rescue boat was equally admirable. And the calming and reassuring influence you all had on the three of us, who were either completely exhausted or ill or sick, was both welcome and heartening. That you as a team are ready at a moment’s notice to leave your lives and put them at risk in the service of others is commendable beyond words.‟ Although he felt embarrassed, he wrote, to be among the first to be rescued by the once-British ADES 19, he also noted how pleased he was to learn of the close international relationship between the maritime rescue services.

News from the UK & Ireland

The UK & Ireland‟s Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) has been working on its new „Shannon‟ class of Fast Carriage Boat - designed for launching and recovery from beaches, etc, where no harbour or slipway can be provided. A prototype of the new, 13 metre vessel is now under construction.

Designed in-house, and with significant input from the crews who will operate the boat, much thought has been given to the layout of decks, steering position and wheelhouse.

Scania 13 engines, driving water jets, will provide power and to spare for a speed of 25 knots.

Last but not least in a carriage boat, a new and robust Supacat launch & recovery tractor has been designed.

The prototypes of the new Shannon lifeboat and its tractor should be ready for trials in the autumn.

Where are they now...?

Here’s another shot from the archives - taken so long ago that the world was black and white...

Aboard the Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue (NSSR)’s Olav V, visiting Stonehaven, Scotland, we see two NSSR officers and two of the IMRF’s current Trustees, looking - how shall we put this? youthful, fit and enthusiastic.

Well: at least the enthusiasm’s undimmed... .

page 5

LIFE LINE

April 2011

News from The Gambia In January this year, the Royal Netherlands Sea Rescue Institution (KNRM) sent two former lifeboats and an instructor to The Gambia.

The much-needed lifeboats were donated to the Gambian Fire Services who also run the sea rescue organisation.

It all started two years ago, when the director and two employees from the Amsterdam chemical company CHEMTURA drove a company fire truck to The Gambia. The fire service chief asked them for some lifeboats too. The director of Chemtura met an old friend, a volunteer at the KNRM, and things started moving. Chemtura has its own charity foundation to give aid to The Gambia and it would pay all the KNRM instructor‟s costs.

The day before Christmas, the instructor, Theo van der Linden, flew to The Gambia - only to realise that there had been a mix-up in the logistics: the boats were still in Amsterdam. There was nothing Theo could do but give the theoretical lessons he had prepared and return later. There were no modern teaching facilities available and he had to constantly improvise; but that, he says, “was part of the fun”.

During that week he visited some lifeboat stations, saw their equipment and noted all the things they didn’t have. There is also no coastguard station in The Gambia: the nearest RCC is in Dakar, Senegal, about 150 kilometres away from Banjul, the Gambian capital. The local boats are solid, but not equipped for rescue work in bad weather. They lack radios, compasses and other navigational aids, and other equipment usually considered essential in a rescue boat. Yet in the first ten months of last year, these boats answered 121 emergency calls in which they saved 108 people - mostly fishermen - and recovered 13 deceased.

Three weeks later, at the end of January when the two containers with the lifeboats and lots of spare parts had been cleared by customs, Theo returned to The Gambia. Each of the six lifeboat stations run by the fire department had sent their three most experienced coxswains to the lifeboat training school in Bakau, where Theo taught them the basics of SAR: slow speed boat handling, recovering a casualty from the water, towing, basic search patterns and first-line maintenance.

A typical Gambian fishing vessel

Distributing fuel for the next two weeks (above); and launch / recovery problems (below)

After the training one of the new boats went to Barra, where its main use will be patient transfer from the north side of the Gambia river to the south side, where the hospital is. Patient transfers are done by lifeboat mainly during the night, when the ferry isn‟t sailing. The other boat will probably stay in Bakau, although it may be based in Tanji, the busiest station in The Gambia.

During the training, Theo found that the crews are very motivated and eager to learn. The main problem they faced was lack of funding. For example, the government allows the fire department only 20 litres of petrol for the lifeboat stations every two weeks, to cover training and rescuing together. Another problem is that there are no proper spare parts for maintaining the boats‟ engines. They cannot buy impellors in The Gambia for the two 8 hp Yamaha outboards each station has, for instance. So the engines lie unused in a corner of the lifeboat station.

Theo found too that the new boats were too heavy for their crews to get them in and out of the sea readily. The boats are on trailers which need at least 12 people to manhandle. The crew are looking for a small 4x4 or tractor - but again funds are the problem.

With this project some specific aid has been given to The Gambia.

More help would obviously be welcome. However, being a charity itself, the KNRM is very limited in what it can itself give away.

“What it can give,” writes Theo, “Is knowledge of search and rescue.

The Gambia is a small country with not much money to spend, but with projects like this we can help it to save fishermen‟s lives.”

Theo van der Linden and the lifeboatmen of the Gambian Fire Service page 6

LIFE LINE

April 2011

News from Sweden

The IMRF at the IMO

Mikael Hinnerson and Fredrik Falkman of Sweden’s FIRST Project (see LIFE LINE, October 2010) write: On March 10, on passage to Frederikshavn in a southwesterly gale, the Stena Jutlandica safely launched her Rescuerunner in order to connect a fall to take on board a 25 person davitlaunched life raft. The life raft was hoisted to the deck and the Rescuerunner recovered successfully.

The drill was carried out in cooperation between Sjöräddningssällskapet (the Swedish Sea Rescue Society) and Stena Line.

The International Maritime Organization (says its website, www.imo.org) “is the United Nations specialized agency with responsibility for the safety and security of shipping and the prevention of marine pollution by ships.” In other words, for all international maritime matters including SAR - the IMO sets the rules. And, comprised as it is of many Member States and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), it tends to work very slowly, and in many committees, in order to do so.

The IMRF is an NGO recognised by the IMO: we have „consultative status‟ and attend relevant meetings. In January, for example, we contributed to the Sub-Committee on Stability, Load Lines and Fishing Vessel Safety‟s work, on developing safety standards for small fishing boats. And in March we attended the Ship Design and Equipment Sub-Committee, where efforts to improve ships‟ ability to recover people from survival craft or from the water continue to be the subject of industry concern.

Stena Jutlandica hoists the raft aboard while the Rescuerunners wait in the area of sea calmed by the ferry’s turn

The FIRST team have also visited Viking Life-Saving Equipment in Esbjerg, Denmark. One of the positive outcomes of this was Viking‟s assertion that there should be no technical problems in lifting a davit-launched raft with people in it. The raft is even strong enough to be lifted populated and filled with water. The largest davit-launch raft currently in production will take 39 people. The team hope to try recovery of this size later this year. “As we have handled standard rafts with up to 51 persons in fresh winds with no trouble,” they say, “We're confident that this will work well.”

Our „main‟ Sub-Committee, though, is that on Radiocommunications and SAR (COMSAR), where IMRF contributions are often welcomed.

COMSAR also met in March this year: one of the actions arising is a review of IMO‟s guidance on cold water survival, and the treatment of people who have been recovered from cold water. The IMRF is chairing this review.

More on all this in future editions of LIFE LINE.

News from Canada Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary (Pacific) Station 20 Salish Sea recently hosted a joint training exercise with the newly re-operational Station 25 Gulf Islands and the Coast Guard hovercraft Penac. The exercise featured a simulated vessel explosion / sinking with three persons in the water.

Casualties (played by Penac divers) were recovered from the water, given “medical attention” and transferred to the hovercraft, with a brief provided to the on-board medical crew. While the main focus of the exercise was on crew safety working alongside large vessels, other training areas covered included search patterns, man overboard, first aid, rescue / recovery, SAR unit performance, confined boat handling and VHF communication.

The exercise was run twice so that all could participate, and a debrief was held, focusing on what worked, what didn‟t work, and strategies for improvement. A few „curves‟ gave the crews some surprises: they were not expecting to recover „live‟ persons from the water, for instance, a situation which challenged them to think quickly.

The exercise was well publicized and received an excellent turnout of spectators - raising public awareness of SAR. Congratulations are also due on the selection of the Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary National as a charity of choice in lieu of gifts for the upcoming Royal Wedding - the only charity in Canada selected for this honour.

page 7

LIFE LINE

April 2011

SAR Matters

Secretariat news: a refreshed IMRF website

This discussion column provides a forum for LIFE LINE readers worldwide to contribute to debate on any relevant SAR issue.

Comment and/or new items for discussion should be emailed to news@international-maritime-rescue.org.

In this edition we look at how we should learn from experience.

Lessons learned...?

In our last edition we talked about communications. This time let‟s begin to look at a particular aspect of the subject - the communication of lessons learned during drills and actual emergency response. „Lessons learned‟, first of all, can come in two forms: „good‟ and „bad‟. In other words, we can learn from things that went well just as we can from things that do not go well. Unfortunately, people (and our bosses especially!) tend to concentrate on the latter. But, if we really want to learn from our experience so that, next time, we can do things better, we should be considering both.

The problem about communicating lessons learned, though particularly those learned from bad experiences - is that individuals and organisations may be very reluctant to do so.

Saying publically where we got things wrong makes us look bad, and can lead to unpleasant repercussions. This in turn can lead to a reluctance to analyse our performance at all.

This is a great pity - and, in our business, it can be dangerous. If we learn something and fail to pass it on, someone else somewhere else in the world may make the same mistake (or will not be able to learn from something we‟ve tried that went well).

And, in our business, people might die as a result of such a failure to communicate.

We only have space this time to introduce this subject. We will return to it in our next edition, partly because of its general importance; partly because the exchange of experience is one of the IMRF‟s central purposes; and partly because, in the run-up to the World Maritime Rescue Congress, sharing our experience and expertise is certainly something we should be focussing on.

Please do share your experience in the meantime, though - good or bad! Email news@international-maritime-rescue.org.

Had a look at the IMRF website lately? No? Well: next time you get the chance, log on to www.international-maritime-rescue.org and see what‟s new. We hope you‟ll like it!

The site has been made easier to navigate, and has a very useful translation button on its front page. IMRF Members have log-in rights giving them access to services such as an IMRF elibrary and a discussion forum. Members needing to amend their on-line IMRF data contact details, for example - will find that this is now much simpler too.

The new site is the work of Ann Laing‟s small team of volunteers based at Stonehaven in Scotland. Comments and suggestions, please, to a.laing@international-maritime-rescue.org.

Special thanks go to Bronwyn Sutherland (pictured) who has put many hours of her own time into this project - and continues to do so as the site content builds up.

And finally...

We hope that you have found this issue of LIFE LINE informative and useful. We are well aware that there is much more going on among IMRF‟s membership that could be reported here, to the benefit of all - but, of course, we rely on you, the reader, to tell us about it! LIFE LINE and the IMRF website depend on you to provide their contents - your news, your projects, your events, your ideas, your lessons learned.

We also need your pictures, please: good quality pictures (more than 250 kB, if possible) of your SAR units - boats, ships, aircraft, RCCs etc. These will be used in LIFE LINE and on the website - but are also needed for presentations and to accompany press articles about the IMRF and its worldwide work.

Please send articles and pictures (or links to them, with formal permission for them to be used for IMRF purposes) to news@international-maritime-rescue.org.

Let‟s spread the word, for the benefit of all at risk on the world‟s waters.

LIFE LINE page 8