Table of contents: Pages

The importance of Effective communication at sea

Bomb alert at an oil terminal

an alternative watch keeping system

master pilot relationship

the ice field

workload of shipmasters/officers: the problem of stress and fatigue

man overboard

10

freak wave

11

background reading texts

12

journal articles

14

appendix

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I.

The importance of effective communication at sea

Effective communication is an element to ensure safe efficient and profitable ship operations. In case of wrong communication, we can have different problems more severe each other in our professional lives. There are many situations which can cause this ineffectiveness. Firstly, a misunderstanding due to cultural differences; In some countries, the fact of asking to a most graduated officer to repeat an order is seeing like a lack of respect. So those people come on board with this mentality and always said yes even if they didnt understand the order. In this case, to have an effective communication, the officer who gave the order has to ask to the other speaker to repeat what he said. He can be sure to avoid a misunderstanding. And misunderstanding due to and language barriers; many accidents occurred because between crew and master, crew and passengers, they dont speak the same language. This problem happens in ship which has only one nationality crew. So during an operation, the master gives an order and the crew who was on standby, executes it. But the whole operation is going on in their own language, not in English. If they did a mistake, the master or the officer in charge of the operation is not going to localize where the mistake was because he dont understand this language.

Secondly, poor communication which is due to distraction. And then, unadapt signage on board to the intention of passengers. Signage is supposed to be understood by every passenger. They have to be more clear and precise to avoid misunderstanding. To solve those problems in general and avoid misunderstanding communication, English on board have to be compulsory to permit a good comprehension between master, crew and passengers. The use of English is not sufficient because we have too many ways to passing ideas which can garble our messages. So in 2001, the assembly of IMO adopted the standard maritime communication phrases (SMCP) to give only one meaning to the words and a set of messages that are used consistently. SMCP valorize simple, concise and direct language.

The communication is the base of any operation. So an effective one, assure a good comprehension without misunderstanding.

II.

Bomb alert at an oil terminal

1. Letter

Dear Mom, You arent going to believe what happened this morning. I was taking a shower when I hear someone knocking at the door. It was the police and they said to me, Please, put some clothes and follow us. I was surprised and upset to not knowing what I did. I was reticent and they explained me quickly what was happened. A bomb alert has been announced at the terminal next to my apartment. Everyone leaving in the area was evacuated. Outside, there were army and police officers who were organized the evacuation. People next to the terminal were evacuated by bus and other by helicopters and those who was a little bit far, went by their own way. It was amazing the armys deployment in function of the gravity of the situation. Now, everyone is safe and Im in a coffee bar and waiting to go home but I think its going to take a lot of time. Kisses Mom Your Son.

III.

Watch Keeping System

1. List of cons and pros. CONS 6 hours of watch every day can be difficult for older seafarers. The change of the system is not good for them because they were familiar with the previous system. Staying on board during the best time to go ashore.

PROS -

Its improved the efficiency, alertness and personnel performance. They have more rest periods to handle their personal needs with improved morale and led to a positive attitude from the crew or other tasks. Crew can have a normal sleep cycle without interfering (6-8 hours). It reduces the fatigue on board as a result of increasing safety and quality of life.

2. My opinion The alternative system is a basic and simple concept according to the article keeping a watchful eye. Even if Im for this system, I dont agree with the fact that it is a simple concept. There is one watch of 6 hours and one of 2 hours per officers whereas the previous one was 2-4 hours watches. This schedule is the most simple than the alternative schedule which justifies my opinion about a simple concept. Only one schedule possible 0000 0400 0400 0800 0800 200 200 1600 1600 2000 2000 2400 There are many possibilities. 0000 0600 0600 0800 (1200) (1200) 0800 1000 (1800) (1800) 1000 1200 ( 2000) (2000) 1200 1800 ( 2200) (2200) 1800 2400 ( 2400)

Except for the schedule, it is a great system with more advantages than disadvantages. All those pros bring a better quality of life on board. For instance; the crew sleep cycle is better. They can have 6 to 8 hours only for sleeping if they want. Unless they required performing other tasks or personal needs during this rest periods. Only older seafarers dont like an alternative system; it imposed to them as a great and better system for ever whereas there were more familiar with the previous one which, for them was better. Sometimes, changing is not well-saw, but it brings better conditions of life.

IV. 1) The flow chart (cfr annex 1) 2) Relation between pilot and master

Behind the scenes

I agree that Accident often occurs when pilot is on board due to many factors but its not only them who are guilty. The fault can not only be rejecting to the pilot but also, in some case, to the captain, the OOW and vessel managers. First of all, there must have an exchange between pilot and master. Information about maneuvers that are going to take place and maneuverability characteristics of the ship associated to a good communication guarantee safety operation. But in case of bad communication, there is misunderstanding, lack of communication which is some of those factors. Then, pilot is a human. He can make mistake so i think that is a huge error done by a captain if he lets all the command to a pilot. Someone have to assist him and correct in case of mistake. And vessel managers are a part of the problem. For instance, Agent who doesnt keep pilot abreast about vessels ETAs and ETDs. So they dont have update information and they wait for a vessel that is not going to arrive soon. At the end, they are tired and come on board hungry. Consequences; they are reluctant to question, they dont encourage interaction and its an open door to accidents. To assure safety operations, communication is important. And pilot has to be in well condition without fatigue, stress or sickness. To encourage good pilot /master relationship, everyone have to do something.

V.

The ice field

I do not found the video for this step.

VI.

Masters indefatigable

An able bodied seaman is a member of deck crew who is able to perform all the duties of an experienced seaman. Everyone hung up of the master an indefatigable image. He is in charge of all administrative tasks, all duties to the bridge and all his crew. Its a big responsibility that he cant assume lonely if he wants to be 100% fit. According to an example of the article Masters indefatigable, the masters had not more than 4 hours rest during 5 days because of all the responsibility that he has. No human is capable of enduring such fatigue and stress without huge consequences. So, when can he rest? And what kind of measure he has to take? First of all, master could have the responsibility to delegate his responsibility to his second in command. And then he could have more rest and will be the able bodied seaman that everyone expects. He could make clear decision and have a good mental ability. And master can take the initiative to have more rest. For example, he has to keep a personal log of working and sleeping hours. And, with this log book, the local sea authorities control it and detain the ship if the master cannot prove a minimum amount of sleeping hours. Master is an experienced seaman and who inspire the respect of everyone. But his only problems is a lack of rest which can reduce his ability to command. The maritime transportation branch is the only one in which rest is neglected.

VII. Man overboard plans:

Man over board

Incidents about man overboard concern young people between 20-25 years of age. There are people without a lot of experience. In my opinion, in case of this incident, there must have a man overboard plan applicable defending the situation. There are 2. If we saw the man fall overboard If we didnt saw him and we dont know when and how many times he is at the sea. The configuration of the plan: The use of flip cards Bridge procedure; so found the M.O ( man overboard) The treatment in sickbay. All crew have to keep in mind all the step of a M.O operation.

Firstly, during Man overboard operations, there is flip-cards that have procedure to follow in this case and it can help for drills which theorically must be weekly but it is not the case in the real life. Secondly, the Bridge procedure that depend to the situation like I said. If the man is localized, the ship stops his speed and put at sea a lifeboat to save him. But if the man overboard is signaled after hours, the bridge has to send an urgency message to the vessel in vicinity to keep sharp lookout for a man overboard. Our ship still proceeds and let his life on other ship hands. They did it because in maritime word, time is money. So, if a ship spends his time to do the research, it will cost enough to the ships owner and they dont like it. So, I dont really agree with the fact that the both procedure in the text are used for merchant ship. But I think, it efficient. And then, after saving the man overboard, there is the treatment in sick-bay. Im totally agreed with the text, they have the most solution to keep safe a man in hypothermia. Never let him alone and check every 30 minutes his temperature and pulse rate. In general, to avoid this kind of incident, crew has to complete survival course and acquire more experience.

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VIII.

Freak wave

This video is amazing. Before it, I did not know that nobody was certainly sure about the creation of freak waves. People who know the ocean could not believe that a wave of 30 meters, like the one which struck the MUNCHEN, could really occur. Everything was only supposition, hypothesis. Before the reception of the study did on the MUNCHEN incident, a scientist or expert was saying that; a chance of having a wave of 30 meters in the real life is practically zero. This video shows us that we do not know enough about waves, specifically about sea. But we know how dangerous is sea and any vessel could escape without serious damage if she met a freak wave. It is a good video to show how strongly waves are. It is quite amazing and totally supernatural to be in front of a freak wave and survive. But the one which struck the MUNCHEN was apparently tremendous because she was, according to the company, the safest and unsinkable ship. It is amazing to see how there are strong and more it is high, much is powerful. It is a fight between currents going to one side and waves to the other side which create height waves. Something which surprised me, it is the fact that we can predict where and when a wave could form. There are totally unpredictable and the only solution for ship is to avoid dangerous areas. I am certainly sure that I would not want to be in the same situation even if it is guaranteed that I am going to survive.

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IX.

Step 9: The influence of communication problems on crew performance (text: cfr annex 2) Summary:

A safe and efficient ship operation is made by a good communication which is very important, vital. But it is not the first cause of accident in the maritime world. Only a short proportion of serious accidents is attributed to ineffective communication. According to a crew performance assessment, it was found that the number of nationalities on board does not matter. A multinational crew is not a bad solution. But the most problematic in those crews are the language capabilities regarding the internal and external communication which are very important for the quality of the crew performance. Concerning the internal communication, the P&I club found that the use of one official language was the best solution for mixed crews communications problems. According to some studies, this revealed that the adoption of an official language on board does not ameliorate the internal communications problems. Of course, it is English but it might be another language used like official one on board ship and the second language used with the pilot is English. It is not surprising that the number of languages spoken by the bridge team affects their performance. For the external communication, which is between officer members, sign language and diagrams are used. It is not necessary a kind of bad communication. It is a part of normal procedures in some pilotage areas. To improve crew performance and ship safety, the language training has to be improved. My opinion To solve those problems like it says in the text, the language training has to be improved and I am totally agreed. For ship-owners and ship managers, multinational crews are not a bad solution. It is! But it is not for the same reason. They want multinational crew because there are countries where they can find seaman workers at a good price. They do not make benefit if they engaged for instance only Belgian seafarers so they make a crew with Belgian and Philippians. I think that multinational crew is a good thing because we can mixt with people from others culture and try to know more about them if we are open minded. Different cultures do not have only good side. Problems of misunderstanding can occur and it is due to language barriers. To avoid misunderstanding communication, English on board have to be compulsory to permit a good comprehension but not only. A good English level is required too. The use of English is not sufficient because we have too many ways to passing ideas which can garble our messages. SMCP valorize simple, concise and direct language. The communication is the base of any operation. So if there is a bad one, the performance of the crew will be highly influenced by it.

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Men Overboard? (text: cfr annex 3) Summary Today, with technology progress, it is not possible to meet a vessel which required more than 50 crews to operate it. On board ordinary vessel, whatever its size, the number of crew is no more than 10 to 15. There is an automatic systems and equipment incorporate in vessels which did the main operational tasks. There are 3 different aspects of remote-control system. Firstly, the fact that vessel can completely become remote control so totally unmanned. In our days, technically it is possible as many elements that would be essential to such a vessel are already in place. The remote-controlled system has 3 keys areas: the navigational aspect; the control and monitoring of machinery; and monitoring. But some problems appear to it concerning for example the navigation. Like the fact that the vessel will operate automatically, independent of the shore station and many others. And to solve those problems, the only option is to let an experimented human onboard who is going to know what to do in an unexpected situation. The more crucial element of the remotely controlled system is effective communications to give to the shore a sense of real time control. Secondly, the position fixing. And then, another aspect of the system which is advantageous: Data on heading and speed of all vessels in the vicinity of own ships which are available today. All information concerning the ship is given to the shore station to know exactly where the ship is and what exactly is happening around it at all times. Another advantageous development for the automated ship which is a transponder system called automatic identification system (AIS). Vessels could be operated completely automatically at deep sea but there has been one human on board who is going to take control in an emergency. And in coastal waters, control could be taken by the shore staff. With the remote-controlled system, the human error will be reduced but not eliminated.

My opinion

My first thinking is about seafarers who are going to lose their jobs. What going to happen to them? Furthermore what going to happen to maritime school? They are going to restrict her inscription size because companies would need only one man on board? How many ship exits in the world for every seafarer? Even if they decided to apply it, they need experimented seafarers who are totally going to live in her ship, away from their homes and families. And it will be because of ship owners who want to get benefits on the crew costs. I do not agree with the implementation of this kind of system. It could be possible if our world became a world of science fiction but not yet. It is an ingenious system which is useful at deep sea. Automatic navigation but it has to be controlled by someone on board. According to the text, it could reduce the human error. Certainly but it is a human who create it so it can break down. Personally I would not be agree with the fact that human could be replace by machine.

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X.

Step 10 Vietnam sailor saved as 22 crew mates die at sea: (cfr annex 4) Summary

A Vietnamese seaman called Dau Ngoc Hung, survived five days in the ocean. He was wearing only a life jacket like protection which one saved his life after his cargo ship sank. On 23 members of crew, he was the only survivor and he was rescued by the British ship London Courage a week after his own vessel capsized in violent seas. He was founded around 350 kilometers away from the accident position. The Vinalines Queen, which disappeared on Christmas Day, had capsized, without sending a distress signal. The ship was carrying more than 54,000 tons of nickel ore and was travelling from Indonesia to China when it lost contact. He was one of the largest and most modern cargo ships in the Vietnamese fleet, with a capacity of more than 56,000 tons. It had been in service since 2005. According to the survivor, "the vessel sank very quickly after being strongly overturned to the left" in the early hours of Sunday morning. Vietnam had asked for the Philippine, Taiwanese and Japanese coastguards help to find the vessel, but nothing was found until now. Global ship owners association Inter-cargo made a declaration in December 2010 concerning the warning of the hazards of transporting nickel ore which. It said that it may liquefy and cause a dangerous list if it is not loaded as international standards stipulate. It was "completely unacceptable" that three cargo ships, all carrying nickel ore and all loaded in Indonesia, had sunk in 2010 and had killed 44 seamen. Rescue experts quoted in the Vietnamese press said emergency equipment on the vessel should have automatically sent SOS signals to satellites and coastal rescue stations. It is not yet clear why no distress message was transmitted.

My opinion The problem had been found and why government does not take measurements to improve this kind of situation or strongly punish ports or companies? An association of ship owners realizes that cargo ships which carried nickel ore and which was loaded to Indonesia sunk rapidly and make a lot of casualties. Three similar accidents and 44 dead seamen, this is too much. The transport of nickel ore is special and has to be load according international standards. They know that it is a dangerous cargo and why no more precautions are taken especially for it? We could speak about the Indonesian port infrastructure and the manner that port employers work. I do not understand why the SOS signals had not been send to the satellites and coastal rescue stations. Certainly the officer of watch did have the time to push to the distress bottom. But it is amazing that in normal situation, it took no more than 10 seconds to push the distress alert and go away. So imagine that the officer of watch did have enough time; it teaches us that the ship capsized in only 5 seconds no more. They did not have enough time to apply standards procedures in case of distress and to evacuate safely with a lifeboat. It is a miracle that FUNG survive.

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EU Seeks to Expand Anti-Piracy Mission in Somalia (cfr annex 5) Summary Piracy in the Somalia coast stills a huge problem, despite international efforts to eliminate the threat. The EU launched the Operation in December 2008 in order to resolve the problem. The operation includes attacks on onshore infrastructure such as weapons depots. Attacks by Somali pirates may have fallen recently, but they still pose a significant threat to international shipping. The German Foreign Ministry mentioned that the expanded mission would only involve destroying the onshore infrastructure and would not be an operation on land. But German politicians, especially opposition politicians were skeptic about this operation. The German parliament would have to approve a new mandate for Germany's contribution to the mission before Berlin could get involved in onshore operations. Until now, the fight against Somali piracy has been restricted to targeting the boats used by pirates. The main goal is for tracking the mother ships that pirates use to operate far of the coast and also provides escorts to World Food Program vessels delivering food to the Somali people. With Somalia still without a functioning government, the vital trade route wills still a place of piracy acts. The problem of piracy could only be solved if Somalia were to become a stable country again. Many countries, even those which are not in the UE and Somalias traditional government participate to this operation. And together, makes big forces with many soldiers and military. According the European Union Naval Force, the efforts to fight piracy may finally be a real success. There were just 12 attempted pirate attacks in November 2011, down from 35 in the same period last year.

My opinion I totally agree with the fact that if Somalia does not have a stable government, the acts of piracy are not going to stop yet but there is not the only one. There is economical phenomenon, lack of or no sovereign government. At the level of population, more Somali pirates are young people because there are poor and without government there is no more solution for them. It is the way of facility of course and I do not agree with it. It is essential to do something to stop piracy and the plan of the UE is a good operation but I thing a strong measure of deterrence. I am afraid that they hurt innocent people onshore during missions. I understand the reaction of some German politicians who was not really agreed with it. There is soft measure like Convoys, Naval escorts, Self-protection, Private security and Security devices which normally are successful. I have a mixed opinion about this operation and my only fear is about the fact that it could be innocent loses life. Something that I do not understand is the fact that pirates, who are Somalia people, stool the food delivering from the world food program to the poor Somalia people. How could a normal human-being do something like that? It is for its own profit? Of course! Human nature does not have limits.

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Appendix

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