FINLANDS SJÖFART J SUOMEN MERENKULKU 73
A
and most importantly within the operations staff, were
chaotic – with the working language of Italian not being
understood by the majority of the crew of 46 different
nationalities, and many not understanding English.
‘It would be, to those not of the marine industry,
unbelievable that those on the bridge have difficulty in
communicating with each other,’ said Capt Lloyd. ‘Can you
imagine the airline industry behaving in such a fashion?’
Once the ship struck the rocks, breaching five compart-ments,
Capt Schettino appeared to have gone into a state
of shock – with the chief officer describing him as being
‘out of his routine mental state’.
Capt Lloyd questioned whether it was right, under
European human rights law, for the master to be prosecut-ed
when the evidence ‘overwhelmingly suggests’ that he
was affected by trauma, increased by guilt, and was in no
way capable of giving orders or properly assessing the situ-ation.
‘Post-traumatic stress is recognised by the armed
forces, the police, the fire brigades and even industry
ashore, so why not at sea?’ he noted. ‘Why was this not
investigated? I cannot imagine a more traumatic event for
a captain to experience, yet the captain’s mental state and
the staff captain’s failure to assume command was never
mentioned or discussed at the initial inquiry or the trial, or
even the appeal.’
Capt Lloyd said the incident had also demonstrated the
inadequacy of life-saving regulations. Problems with
davits meant that three of 26 lifeboats could not be
launched and only three of the ship’s 69 liferafts were
launched.
Whilst IMO guidelines recommend a maximum allow-able
total passengership evacuation time to be in the range
of 60 to 80 minutes, it took more than six hours to evacu-ate
Costa Concordia despite its close proximity to land
and the considerable assistance of shore rescue facilities.
The ship’s increasing starboard list caused significant
difficulties in embarking on survival craft, especially on
the port side, Capt Lloyd said. The Italian investigation had
failed to adequately assess evidence that even at an angle
of 15 degrees, 5 degrees less than the required launching
angle, lifeboats could not be launched.
Costa Concordia had theoretical lifeboat capacity for
1,860 passengers on each side, he added. Under the IMO’s
Life Saving Appliance (LSA) Code, the lifeboats should be
boarded within 10 minutes – a rate equivalent to one
passenger every four seconds.
However, Capt Lloyd argued, the reality is that such
rates are impossible to achieve, and increases in the
weight and size of people since the formulae were deter-mined
mean that the space and weight allocations defined
in the LSA Code are also unrealistic, with studies showing
that capacity is over-estimated by around 15%.
The failure to launch so many liferafts might be
explained by the fact that a significant proportion of the
crew assigned to them lacked the necessary certification
or training, Capt Lloyd said.
Following an abandon-ship drill in October 2011, the
master had warned the company that the performance of
his crew was decreasing and showed critical findings, he
added.
Capt Lloyd said the Italian inquiry had missed many
facts of seamanship and safety, and ignored key elements
of the International Safety Management Code, which
clearly states that the captain of a ship cannot be delegat-ed
the sole responsibility for the total operation of the
ship, as it is the company that has this ultimate responsi-bility.
The investigation had failed to address issues such as
the inadequacy of the charts in use at the time of the
accident, the safety of people trapped in lifts following
power failures, and issues around the responsibilities of
the owner, the classification society and the flag state.
Pointing to the similarities with the Titanic disaster
– almost exactly 100 years earlier – in terms of the damage
suffered by ships that had been described as unsinkable,
Capt Lloyd argued that the Costa Concordia accident
should put an end to the IMO’s ‘absurd’ concept of a ship
being its own lifeboat.
‘I do not discount the possibility of designing ships that
have a far better chance of this than the present genera-tion,
but considering the reluctance of many of these
companies to even place adequate lifejackets onboard, I
have a feeling that it will be a long time before we see the
changes in design and management attitude required,’ he
added.
F Costa
Concordia
master
Captain
Francesco
Schettino
is now
serving a
16-year
prison
sentence.
G The ill-fated route followed by Costa Concordia
on the day it ran aground in January 2012.