Rena fault finding call

The investigation into causes behind the Rena striking Astrolabe Reef in 2011 finds fault with the bridge crew, their training and their management systems.

The Transport Accident Investigation Commission report revealed the causes of the wreck of the container ship were due to human error as opposed to any on-board machinery or equipment.


Chief commissioner John Marshall QC.

The Rena's voyage from Napier to Tauranga didn't meet the standards in the ships owner's CIEL safety management system or the International Maritime Organization Voyage Planning Guidelines, says chief commissioner John Marshall QC.

Nor did it meet best industry practice.

The reports underlines how the ship cut corners, deviating from the passage plan in order to meet the 3am tidal window at the Port of Tauranga pilot station.

If the bridge crew had been using the full navigational information available to them, they would have realised the currents were against them all the way up the East Coast from Napier, making the 3am arrival almost impossible.

The ship struck the reef at full speed after the second mate changed course to save time.

'The bridge crew progressively adjusted the automatic pilot to an incorrect heading and without making allowance for any leeway, set or gyrocompass error,” says the commissioner.

'The resultant ground track took the ship directly over the reef. Not monitoring the progress of the ship against the deviation directly contributed to the grounding.”

The investigation finds the crew's failure to follow industry best practice for making and executing the passage plan wasn't an isolated case, as previous voyage revealed a number of acts and omissions similar to those made on the Tauranga voyage.

The standard of watchkeeping on board the Rena for the watch period during which the grounding occurred didn't comply with requirements, while the crew weren't following company procedures with respect to monitoring the progress of the ship in relation to known dangers.

That failure to adequately monitor the progress of the Rena directly contributed to the grounding.

It is also noted that the second mate didn't make effective use of the bridge navigation equipment on board the Rena before the grounding.

'It would have been a simple task to program the position of Astrolabe Reef into the radar,” adds the Commissioner.

'This action would almost certainly have prevented the grounding because the radar was the first equipment that the master used when he took control of the bridge,” says John.

'Astrolabe Reef would have been clearly shown on the radar as being directly ahead of the ship.”

Also revealed was the fact that the ship's second radar wasn't switched on, which would have increased the chance of locating a faint target like the Astrolabe Reef.

'Had he done so either he or the master would have been alerted to the presence of Astrolabe Reef in time to avert the grounding,” says John.

The master assumed control of the Rena when the ship was tracking directly for Astrolabe Reef.

John adds: "There was no clear delineation of who had control of the Rena at the time of the grounding, and the master, having assumed that he had taken control, had received virtually no information on where the ship was, where it was heading, and what immediate dangers to navigation he needed to consider.

The full report is available online here.

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7 comments

Fastest

Posted on 19-12-2014 09:35 | By YOGI BEAR

Track to the port, can have a few bumps along the way, the scenario is as many have noted before, the Rena is not the only one to do the short cut thing, it is in fact common practice.


All the money spent!!!!

Posted on 19-12-2014 09:37 | By Jimmy Ehu

to actually find the obvious, what a crock of S**t.


What a remarkable report???

Posted on 19-12-2014 09:48 | By BullShtAlert

It seems to say exactly what was obvious from the beginning. I wonder what it cost? I wonder if a secondary school class could have come up with the same result? They could have chucked in cliched phrases like "did not meet best practice" too and sounded really profound.


Liberian Registered

Posted on 19-12-2014 15:16 | By Jitter

This is the first and probably the main problem. Many Liberian registered ships and crews are just not up to required world wide high maritime standards and do not comply with maritime law. I worked for a very large international shipping company in the 1980s which operated conventional vessels, large container vessels (66,000 tonnes), bulk tankers and parcel tankers and all these and crews complied with maritime law and necessary high qualifications and experience required. We were constantly hearing of Liberian registered ships which were not up to standard and due to lack of maintenance of equipment(navigational, cargo handling and propulsion etc) were a danger to both their own crew and all other vessels at sea.I don't know how these problems can be overcome as long as ships can be registered under a flag of convenience no matter what their condition or the qualifications of the crew.


Any actual results?

Posted on 19-12-2014 15:28 | By dgk

And do you think anything will happen to ensure ships crews are in fact competent? Or that those on drilling rigs are qualified, and actually awake?


Rastus

Posted on 19-12-2014 15:58 | By rastus

I listened to this guy on radio this morning and when asked to explain what he and his overpaid committee had found that was new, he was very obviously struggling to justify the three year junket - This country has got to challenge all this total waste of resource - printing a huge documented report that basically 'No One' is ever going to read is symptomatic of a system that has had its day. Three years to get a result is just BS and this sort of carry on starts in our so called justice system where a murderer/rapist or other low life gets to spend years(s) before the case gets to court - I ask 'Why' is it deliberate so that peoples information/testomonty etc fades and gets rewritten with time to suit the so called justice industry - in many countries a murder case can be heard andconcludedin3wks


Surprise, Surprise!!

Posted on 19-12-2014 18:16 | By Mackka

Three years later and God knows how many thousands spent on an outcome that we all knew right from the start! How stupid can these people be - it never ceases to amaze! They out do themselves every time! I assume they are really going to out do themselves with the 'Toxic Mould' farce!!


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