THURSDAY EDITION
NOVEMBER 29, 2018, NEW ORLEANS, LA.
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SHOW DAILY NTSB got help looking at El Faro
Sub M regs are already causing important changes
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Brian Curtis of the NTSB.
Doug Stewart
he National Transportation Safety Board could not have determined what sank the El Faro with her crew of 33 had it not been for help from experts in deep ocean exploration, said Brian Curtis, director of the agency’s marine safety office. “We never found any personal items from the crew,” Curtis said of the 2015 sinking of the 790’ ro/ro containership in Hurricane Joaquin. “We had no vessel, we had no survivors.” All that the NTSB and Coast Guard had in those first days was a recorded phone call from El Faro captain Michael Davidson to ship operators TOTE Maritime in Florida, telling them the vessel was in imminent danger. But investigators knew the El Faro carried a voyage data recorder that would have at least 12 hours of crew conversations on the bridge. “Now, we’re looking for something the size of two basketballs in the ocean, and we don’t even know where the ship went down,” Curtis recalled. The deep-sea collaboration that followed brought the Coast Guard and NTSB into close partnership with the
Coast Guard and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. Two missions to the area of the sinking east of the Bahamas by the Navy salvage ship Apache and the Woods Hole research vessel Atlantis located the wreck of the El Faro in 15,000’ of water, the upper decks of the house torn off in the sinking, and finally the VDR itself. Retrieved in a third sortie by the Apache, the VDR was brought ashore and 26 hours of conversations analyzed – the key evidence for an investigation that brought 53 safety recommendations. — Kirk Moore
Autonomous vessels and developing technology
Mike Johnson, founder and CEO of Sea Machines.
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spection that reveals the vessel is not in compliance. “If there is a marine casualty, the vessel can be subjected to a Subchapter M on the spot,” he said. “Inspections are more rigorous than expected, and tugboats can be inspected at any time. I don’t think tug operators had expected that.” Under Subchapter M, operators must have a Certificate of Inspection from the Coast Guard to maintain fleet operations. Two options are available to help them reach compliance: under the Towing Safety Management System option, routine inspections of vessels will be done by an outside auditor based on a safety system tailored to a fleet’s needs. For operators preferring not to develop their own safety systems, they can opt to have the Coast Guard do the inspections. Smith said given the diversified nature of Stevens Towing’s business and the heavy paperwork involved in compliance, they chose Coast Guard inspections, “preferring to get third party inspections with no agenda.” — Pamela Glass
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 29
and CEO of Sea Machines. Sea Machines is now working with Maersk on trialing autonomous technology in that role on a crewed containership in the Baltic. Johnson and Allard say the technology can apply as a smart autopilot. — Kirk Moore
STOP!
Stevens Towing’s Bos Smith.
TODAY’S WORKBOAT SHOW SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE
Doug Stewart
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till-developing technology and markets for autonomous vessels could take the infant sector in unexpected directions, two leading-edge providers said Wednesday at the International WorkBoat Show. Thinking about mating solar energy panels and electric drives to autonomous patrol boats raises the prospect of picket vessels with ultra long endurance, said Chris Allard, CEO of Metal Shark, which unveiled its first Defender-class patrol vessel equipped with ASV Global technology recently. “If you take away the two to four gallons per hour for stationkeeping, we’ve done scenarios where it’s startlingly close to infinite,” said Allard. Autonomous functions will complement navigation bridge crews, effectively extending eyes and ears with their sensors, said Michael Johnson, founder
t’s only been four months since the new federal inspection program, Subchapter M, was officially implemented, requiring towing vessels to comply with a host of new rules to improve safety in the tug, towboat and barge industry. But vessel operators say this new regulatory regime has already caused important changes in the way they do business. The shifts are many: a decline in the number of towboats in the fleet as older boats that can’t be brought up to Coast Guard standards are retired; more expensive and extensive repairs to get boats into compliance; a drop in value of vessels not passing inspection and many being sold; and a rise in construction of new vessels to meet new requirements and replace those retired, Benjamin B. “Bos” Smith, vice president of operations at Stevens Towing, Yonges Island, S.C., told Tugs and Coastal Towing Program attendees on Tuesday. “This is what we’ve seen so far under Subchapter M,” he said. Under the new regime, which was published in 2016 after years of delays and public hearings, operators had until July 20, 2018, to get their vessels in compliance, but the required Coast Guard vessel inspections to check compliance are being phased in over four years. This has resulted in some confusion in the industry, Smith said, causing many companies to wrongly think that they can put off compliance until the Coast Guard inspection is done. But in reality, their vessels must be in compliance as of July 20 of this year. Some are discovering this the hard way. Should a vessel be involved in a marine casualty that involves dry docking, this can spark a Coast Guard in-
THINK TANK: 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM SUBCHAPTER M HAS ARRIVED. NOW WHAT? THINK TANK: 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM U.S. COAST GUARD BOAT FORCES, STRATEGIC OUTLOOK: LIFECYCLE STATUS OF A 1,650-BOAT FLEET
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