Terrible ferry tragedy off South Korea
Discussion
Without trying to make baseless generalizations, Having spent some time in South Korea, unfortunately I'm of no doubt that the high fatality rate will be at least in no insignificant part due to cultural factors.
It would be almost unheard of for a student to challenge an instruction to stay where they are from any source of perceived authority, and I'd expect they'd do what they were told, or believe they had been told, right up until the point they are getting wet.
It would be almost unheard of for a student to challenge an instruction to stay where they are from any source of perceived authority, and I'd expect they'd do what they were told, or believe they had been told, right up until the point they are getting wet.
If the timeline on the wiki page is remotely accurate the deceased are dead because the crew failed to evacuate them, they wasted the 15-20 minute window available to them to evacuate in a controlled manner. The explanation for not evacuating of the water being cold and the current strong is nonsense; the ship has liferafts and lifeboats for this purpose, yet most of them are still in their racks and davits on the ship. I cannot understand how this has happened so short a time after the debacle of the Concordia.
hidetheelephants said:
If the timeline on the wiki page is remotely accurate the deceased are dead because the crew failed to evacuate them, they wasted the 15-20 minute window available to them to evacuate in a controlled manner. The explanation for not evacuating of the water being cold and the current strong is nonsense; the ship has liferafts and lifeboats for this purpose, yet most of them are still in their racks and davits on the ship. I cannot understand how this has happened so short a time after the debacle of the Concordia.
It would be interesting to find out the actual percentage of crew members that make up the figures of survivors as opposed to passengers.It's obvious that the Captain etc found no problems in facing the potential 'risks' of evacuating the ship using the emergency equipment provided on it.The reports of the failed evacuation of the passengers seem to suggest that the crew were refusing to issue life jackets and to arrange the launching of life boats and rafts from a ship which was in obvious danger of capsizing on the grounds of the 'risks' to the passengers.Those 'risks' as being relied on as an excuse seem to have been based on the premise on the crew didn't intend on waiting around to launch the boats/rafts.
In that regard this example seems far worse than what took place on the Concordia where at least the crew did stick to their posts to launch the life boats regardless of the actions of it's Captain and those crewmembers who facilitated his and their own escape at the expense of sorting out their passengers first.
It's examples like this which could cause a serious breakdown of trust between passengers and crew at least in regards to the issues of being ordered to wait inside a ship in trouble and in regards to the allocation of life jackets.
At least in cases where they aren't pre allocated to passengers in cabins.That idea in itself being open to question in the case of passengers being away from their cabins at the time an emergency occurs and with no way back to collect anything to prepare for evacuation.
The fact is there is an obvious inconsistency between passengers putting their trust in crew members to sort things out regarding evacuation when the crew's own self preservation interests could possibly contrary to doing so.In general in the case of emergencies on ships the question is the allocation of life jackets and the release of life boats/rafts when either or both may be against the self interest of crew members waiting around with that task.In which case having pre allocated life jackets in a cabin which at least provides the passenger with the choice of jump or stay,assuming it remains accessible to grab it and then get out on deck,is probably about as good as it gets in the case of not having 100% trust in what the ship's crew is saying and on the basis that if a ship seems to be in serious trouble then it probably is and it's then a matter of personal choice as to wether to jump or wait.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-27096629
ked about.
hidetheelephants said:
If the timeline on the wiki page is remotely accurate the deceased are dead because the crew failed to evacuate them, they wasted the 15-20 minute window available to them to evacuate in a controlled manner. The explanation for not evacuating of the water being cold and the current strong is nonsense; the ship has liferafts and lifeboats for this purpose.
Yep- and the captain seems to suggest there were only 2 options : stay in cabins - or jump into the sea !!! Whatever happened to 'put on life jacket go to muster stations and wait on deck'?!!alfaman said:
hidetheelephants said:
If the timeline on the wiki page is remotely accurate the deceased are dead because the crew failed to evacuate them, they wasted the 15-20 minute window available to them to evacuate in a controlled manner. The explanation for not evacuating of the water being cold and the current strong is nonsense; the ship has liferafts and lifeboats for this purpose.
Yep- and the captain seems to suggest there were only 2 options : stay in cabins - or jump into the sea !!! Whatever happened to 'put on life jacket go to muster stations and wait on deck'?!!While it seems obvious in this case that there is a question concerning the fact that the crew were obviously applying double standards in regards to leaving passengers waiting inside because of the so called 'risks' of evacuation of the ship.While those 'risks' then seem to have conveniently disappeared in the case of many of the crew's own escape.
There is, it's called the emergency evacuation drill; in the UK and europe(and the US for all I know) there's a plaque on every cabin door with detailed instructions for how to find your muster station, where to find a life jacket and what to do in the event of an evacuation(warm clothing, no baggage etc.). There are duplicate plaques throughout the public areas of all passenger ferries. I assume the same is the case for Korean Register ships, as they are bound by the same basic IMO regulations which national rules are drawn from.
hidetheelephants said:
There is, it's called the emergency evacuation drill; in the UK and europe(and the US for all I know) there's a plaque on every cabin door with detailed instructions for how to find your muster station, where to find a life jacket and what to do in the event of an evacuation(warm clothing, no baggage etc.). There are duplicate plaques throughout the public areas of all passenger ferries. I assume the same is the case for Korean Register ships, as they are bound by the same basic IMO regulations which national rules are drawn from.
The allocation of life jackets varies from being available in cabins to needing crew members to stand by and hand them out from lockers which can be situated inside near muster stations or sometimes on deck.The release of lifeboats/rafts also requires a large input from crew members.It's obvious that the latter two examples require a lot of trust in the discipline of the crew who'll be well aware of the ship's situation and would need to forget all about their own instincts to leave the ship as soon as possible.The question in this case seems to be did the crew with the task of carrying out the evacuation allow their own instincts to run to override the evacuation of the passengers.The actions of at least the Captain and the numbers regarding the proportion of crew v passengers who survived seem to speak for themselves.
V8 Fettler said:
Should there not be a detailed process for the crew to follow in the event of a potentially catastrophic event? Automated voice announcements as the process develops? Key decisions made by the captain (or his stand-in) as the process develops? It's probably all in the O&M manual...
Impractical due to the huge amount of different things that can go tits up on a ship.There is normal a rough plan as in if fire in area X then shut down this and deploy this fire fightening system
Also these comparments are flooded then do X and Y
XJ Flyer said:
In general as I've pointed out previously there's a contradiction between the idea of 'muster stations' which are usually inside as opposed to standing by on deck.In the case of a potentially unpredictably fast capsizing ship all mustering needs to be carried out on deck.Which still leaves the question as to how far the crew can even then be trusted,to have the discipline,to put the evactuation of the passengers on at least an equal level as their own.
followed byXJ Flyer said:
The release of lifeboats/rafts also requires a large input from crew members.It's obvious that the latter two examples require a lot of trust in the discipline of the crew who'll be well aware of the ship's situation and would need to forget all about their own instincts to leave the ship as soon as possible.
you have got the reason why muster stations are away from lifeboats and life raftsYou don't know how to launch a lifeboat/liferaft.
I do and quite frankly you are more then likely to get in the way then help.
Muster stations are where they are for a reason
And this wasn't a fast capsize it took 2 hours
This was a failure of the crew not of the process
McWigglebum4th said:
XJ Flyer said:
In general as I've pointed out previously there's a contradiction between the idea of 'muster stations' which are usually inside as opposed to standing by on deck.In the case of a potentially unpredictably fast capsizing ship all mustering needs to be carried out on deck.Which still leaves the question as to how far the crew can even then be trusted,to have the discipline,to put the evactuation of the passengers on at least an equal level as their own.
followed byXJ Flyer said:
The release of lifeboats/rafts also requires a large input from crew members.It's obvious that the latter two examples require a lot of trust in the discipline of the crew who'll be well aware of the ship's situation and would need to forget all about their own instincts to leave the ship as soon as possible.
you have got the reason why muster stations are away from lifeboats and life raftsYou don't know how to launch a lifeboat/liferaft.
I do and quite frankly you are more then likely to get in the way then help.
Muster stations are where they are for a reason
And this wasn't a fast capsize it took 2 hours
This was a failure of the crew not of the process
XJ Flyer said:
The incident seems to have taken place over a matter of hours in total from the point of listing to rolling over and effectively sinking.However the difference,between a situation,that would have allowed the evacuation of large amounts of passengers remaining inside,to one in which it was no longer possible,seems to have been more like a matter of minutes as would be expected.In which case it seems obvious that in such situations mustering needs to be carried out on decks with passengers told to stand by to jump if required as the situation develops.It's also obvious that needs to be carried out in a way which won't interfere with the release of the boats/rafts.As we've seen in this case the idea of mustering inside seems to have been taken advantage of by a crew that were mainly out to save themselves at the expense of their passengers.
Why bother with musteringjust go straight to jumping over the side
first sign of any trouble then everyone over the side
Small fire in the workshop
Everyone over the side
Total blackout
Everyone over the side
Leak in the engineroom
Everyone over the side
Oh you do know the QE2 did have a serious flooding incident a while back
http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/qe2...
They didn't throw everyone over the side
I do actually question if you have ever been on a large ship as the mustering area is very close to the lifeboats
To get people out on decks on a modern ship away from the lifeboats would probably mean they are mustering FURTHER away from the lifeboats are then the current muster stations are.
Also read the link i have posted
Do you think it would be wise to have everyone mustered on deck for 3 days?
McWigglebum4th said:
XJ Flyer said:
The incident seems to have taken place over a matter of hours in total from the point of listing to rolling over and effectively sinking.However the difference,between a situation,that would have allowed the evacuation of large amounts of passengers remaining inside,to one in which it was no longer possible,seems to have been more like a matter of minutes as would be expected.In which case it seems obvious that in such situations mustering needs to be carried out on decks with passengers told to stand by to jump if required as the situation develops.It's also obvious that needs to be carried out in a way which won't interfere with the release of the boats/rafts.As we've seen in this case the idea of mustering inside seems to have been taken advantage of by a crew that were mainly out to save themselves at the expense of their passengers.
Why bother with musteringjust go straight to jumping over the side
first sign of any trouble then everyone over the side
Small fire in the workshop
Everyone over the side
Total blackout
Everyone over the side
Leak in the engineroom
Everyone over the side
Oh you do know the QE2 did have a serious flooding incident a while back
http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/qe2...
They didn't throw everyone over the side
I do actually question if you have ever been on a large ship as the mustering area is very close to the lifeboats
To get people out on decks on a modern ship away from the lifeboats would probably mean they are mustering FURTHER away from the lifeboats are then the current muster stations are.
Also read the link i have posted
Do you think it would be wise to have everyone mustered on deck for 3 days?
What I've actually described is the type of case where it's obvious using common sense that a ship is in relatively foreseeable serious trouble.As opposed to something which can be dealt with by an engineering solution and pumping or a fire which can be brought under control and which therefore isn't likely to sink the ship or burn it out.
The actions of many of the crew in managing to save themselves at the expense of passengers being trapped inside a capsizing ship shows that difference in this case.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-27087469
XJ Flyer said:
As I said yes I have travelled many miles by sea over the years and ironically more than one transatlantic crossing on the old QE2.Knowing the systems to keep it afloat I'd guess that there was no real chance of a flooded aft engine room putting the ship and it's passengers into anything like the type of danger which the type of list involved this case did.
What I've actually described is the type of case where it's obvious using common sense that a ship is in relatively foreseeable serious trouble.As opposed to something which can be dealt with by an engineering solution and pumping or a fire which can be brought under control and which therefore isn't likely to sink the ship or burn it out.
And you still don't understand the purpose of the muster stationsWhat I've actually described is the type of case where it's obvious using common sense that a ship is in relatively foreseeable serious trouble.As opposed to something which can be dealt with by an engineering solution and pumping or a fire which can be brought under control and which therefore isn't likely to sink the ship or burn it out.
McWigglebum4th said:
XJ Flyer said:
As I said yes I have travelled many miles by sea over the years and ironically more than one transatlantic crossing on the old QE2.Knowing the systems to keep it afloat I'd guess that there was no real chance of a flooded aft engine room putting the ship and it's passengers into anything like the type of danger which the type of list involved this case did.
What I've actually described is the type of case where it's obvious using common sense that a ship is in relatively foreseeable serious trouble.As opposed to something which can be dealt with by an engineering solution and pumping or a fire which can be brought under control and which therefore isn't likely to sink the ship or burn it out.
And you still don't understand the purpose of the muster stationsWhat I've actually described is the type of case where it's obvious using common sense that a ship is in relatively foreseeable serious trouble.As opposed to something which can be dealt with by an engineering solution and pumping or a fire which can be brought under control and which therefore isn't likely to sink the ship or burn it out.
At which point at least one passenger asks the question what if the ship rolls to the point where evacuation is no longer possible and water is coming in faster than we can get out.To which the answer from the Captain 'would be' don't ask me because by that point myself and most of the crew will be long gone because we won't be waiting here inside a capsizing ship like we're telling you to do.
Edited by XJ Flyer on Tuesday 22 April 20:22
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