Ship stuck on Bramble Bank.
Discussion
maser_spyder said:
Just disappeared down the Internet wormhole for two hours reading the Cheeki Rafiki report (one of the poor chaps comes from the same place as me). Horrible reading, there's loads of reported comms and you get a feel for the panic that must have set in when they realised it was a major problem.
Seems like there were some major inadequacies in their planning, liferaft in a valise in a cockpit locker, epirb not free floating, etc. Don't get me wrong, my epirb is on a bracket next to the chart table, and my liferaft is in a valise in the cockpit locker, but I'm not crossing the Altantic.
The other thing that comes across is the boat was potentially knackered. Numerous reported groundings, repairs to the keel area, and so on.
Hindsight is so easy to say they never should have been there, just a shame it was such a hard earned lesson.
Read that report this morning, I can't imagine being 22 years old and floating in the middle of the Atlantic knowing your going to drown. Terrible.Seems like there were some major inadequacies in their planning, liferaft in a valise in a cockpit locker, epirb not free floating, etc. Don't get me wrong, my epirb is on a bracket next to the chart table, and my liferaft is in a valise in the cockpit locker, but I'm not crossing the Altantic.
The other thing that comes across is the boat was potentially knackered. Numerous reported groundings, repairs to the keel area, and so on.
Hindsight is so easy to say they never should have been there, just a shame it was such a hard earned lesson.
Not exactly an easy read 
Can't believe that basic rules of loading a ship were ignored! And weights were Estimated! Kin Hell 
The standard of some foreign crews is really not up to scratch, far to much reliance on computers without understanding the principals, in my job I was showing young people a calculation on a calculator, data was entered a mistake was made and the answer was massively different from what should be expected, they appeared to totally trust the calculator, without understanding the basic maths it was performing, so we're unable to spot the problem, the same problem can exist on board ships.
PRTVR said:
The standard of some foreign crews is really not up to scratch, far to much reliance on computers without understanding the principals, in my job I was showing young people a calculation on a calculator, data was entered a mistake was made and the answer was massively different from what should be expected, they appeared to totally trust the calculator, without understanding the basic maths it was performing, so we're unable to spot the problem, the same problem can exist on board ships.
I don't think it's fair to entirely blame the crew in this instance, it's not as if they were a Vietnamese fishing junk. Like many things in the modern world the pressure is on to 'turn around' as quickly as possible. Like and airliner sat on the tarmac, a ship in port isn't earning! The First officer is only one person and he can't be everwhere at once, he can't weigh every single vehicle personally, and can't oversee their exact placement. If you read the report you'll also see that multiple things happened that weren't on the schedule and decisions were taken by the loading/shore crew to add more kit at the last minute. The first officer did his calcs and relised that the safety margin was lower than expected (but within limits) and also that the trim was opposite to his predictions, so he did re-run the calcs. It's hardly the same as your example where it was massively out through his incorrect input. The data he was provided with was wrong to start with. His undoing was proabably not telling the master to stop and wait for his re-assesed calcs. I'm sure they all felt under pressure to meet a departure slot. That comes to light when the Pilot noticed it felt wrong and asked the Master of the stability status. The Master didn't know and the First Officer responded with "I'm working on it" as they were sailing down Southampton Water. Buy then, as with many disaster type scenarios too many things had occoured and the ship's fate was already sealed.
The first officer said:
PRTVR said:
The standard of some foreign crews is really not up to scratch, far to much reliance on computers without understanding the principals, in my job I was showing young people a calculation on a calculator, data was entered a mistake was made and the answer was massively different from what should be expected, they appeared to totally trust the calculator, without understanding the basic maths it was performing, so we're unable to spot the problem, the same problem can exist on board ships.
I don't think it's fair to entirely blame the crew in this instance, it's not as if they were a Vietnamese fishing junk. Like many things in the modern world the pressure is on to 'turn around' as quickly as possible. Like and airliner sat on the tarmac, a ship in port isn't earning! The First officer is only one person and he can't be everwhere at once, he can't weigh every single vehicle personally, and can't oversee their exact placement. If you read the report you'll also see that multiple things happened that weren't on the schedule and decisions were taken by the loading/shore crew to add more kit at the last minute. The first officer did his calcs and relised that the safety margin was lower than expected (but within limits) and also that the trim was opposite to his predictions, so he did re-run the calcs. It's hardly the same as your example where it was massively out through his incorrect input. The data he was provided with was wrong to start with. His undoing was proabably not telling the master to stop and wait for his re-assesed calcs. I'm sure they all felt under pressure to meet a departure slot. That comes to light when the Pilot noticed it felt wrong and asked the Master of the stability status. The Master didn't know and the First Officer responded with "I'm working on it" as they were sailing down Southampton Water. Buy then, as with many disaster type scenarios too many things had occoured and the ship's fate was already sealed.Impasse said:
It seems the initial reports of skilful manoeuvring by the pilot and/or captain to beach the ship onto the sandbank were greatly exaggerated as the vessel was powerless by then and it was nothing but fair winds and fortune which guided them to temporary safety.
I got that impression also.Thanks to whoever posted the link to the report.
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