Fire on dive boat Conception in CA

[JohnnyC]

IF....IF it was a battery fire, it could have very easily gotten out of control in a matter of seconds. Here's a Tesla battery going up. It goes from zero to hero in no time flat. That's a really big pack. but you can see how just one cell starts a thermal runaway on all of the adjacent cells. One 4-cell battery charger turns into a willy pete grenade in an enclosed space.

Not at 6:30 in the video, he says, "We can't put it out!"


Adding a NASA video. Thing goes up like a torch, CO2 fire extinguisher didn't even touch it.

 

[ibj40]

Checked Internet yesterday - The business was registered in Winters, CA (near Sacramento) - for the diving trip, they had posted to send checks to a PO Box in Twin Bridges, CA (near lake Tahoe) and the dive leader/organizer was from Santa Cruz. They did not have a bus leaving from any central location in Northern California for this trip. The instructions were to meet in Santa Barbara. However, press conference yesterday said that the Sacramento Coroner's office was involved.

Owner of Santa Cruz adventure company missing after deadly boat fire

 

[EricTheDood]

With a 100% fatality rate among paying customers, I can't see how Truth Aquatics will recover from this horrible disaster.

For the remaining California charters, which all have similar boats with below-deck bunk rooms / death traps, I'm very curious as to how they plan on moving forward.

 

[DrMack]

If that is what happened I suspect it's going to be more like stainless steel enclosures outside the cabin with nothing above them.

Like this: PULSE Lipo-Lithium Battery Charging Safe Box

 

[KathyV]

It's been confirmed that there were no survivors other than the 5 crew members:

No one found alive after dive boat catches fire; 34 dead

 

[scubadada]

You've been on a boat just like it, Mike. Spree was patterned (by the original owner) after the California liveaboards. I felt that a crew of 5 couldn't properly service 34 divers, and cut back to 24. But except for the sleeping on the floor, same same.

Anyone who ever dived off the Spree know what kind of boat Frank, @Wookie, ran. How many boats have you been on where the Captain personally asked each diver how they felt after every dive? The Spree was the only boat of this type I ever dived off of, it was perfectly fine for me and my son, would not have worked for my wife. I'm only sorry I never made it to the Dry Tortugas or Cuba with Frank and Melanie

 

[DrMack]

The system is called rescue 21, and the panic button from either VHF radio or Single Sideband goes to that system.

If it was properly programmed. There is no regulation for that vessel requiring it to be so.

Rescue 21 is the new USCG communications infrastructure that would receive a DSC transmission from a vessel in distress.

Capt. Wasson(@Wookie): do you know if the Conception is in a class that requires AIS?

 

[Wookie]

The dryer vent at 3:30 in the morning?

Generically, or statistically, dryer vents are the #1 source of ignition on boats. I wouldn't think this boat had a below deck dryer.

 

[HKGuns]

As many people have said, this is a logical fallacy. Drunk drivers likely drive intoxicated a lot before killing someone. They think they are safer because they've never had an accident (proof they are safe) of course, we know that isn't true.

No, stuff happens that isn't necessarily the result of negligence. But that doesn't stop the angry mob from trying to assign blame. I will assume goodness, as I am sure was the case on this boat.

Regardless, they deserve the presumption of innocence, just the same as "potential" drunk drivers.

 

[oh2btru]

A lot of new details here
California boat fire: 4 dead, 30 missing as families seek information

Around 3:15 a.m., Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach watchstanders overheard a mayday call of the boat on fire, according to the agency. Fire department crews were fighting the fire when the boat sank 20 yards off shore in 64 feet of water, with a portion of the bow sticking out of the water.

In a garbled mayday call, a man says there are 39 people aboard.

“I can’t breathe,” the man frantically says.

The five crew members were rescued by a good Samaritan boat, the Grape Escape, according to the agency. Two of them sustained leg injuries.


Shirley Hansen and her husband, Bob, were jarred awake about 3:30 a.m. by the sound of pounding on the side of their 60-foot fishing boat.

The crew had escaped the Conception by jumping into the ocean, retrieving a dinghy and paddling 200 yards to the Hansens’ boat, the Grape Escape, Shirley Hansen said in an interview.

The crew was distraught, some wearing only underwear, she said. One man told the Hansens that his girlfriend was still below deck on the Conception. Another man cried, describing how they had celebrated three passengers’ birthdays hours earlier, including that of a 17-year-old girl who was on the diving trip with her parents.

One crewman’s leg was injured, Shirley Hansen said, and another had visible ankle injuries. She could see the Conception ablaze from her boat and said there was so much smoke that she had to use an inhaler.

As the Hansens handed out blankets and clothes to the crew, two of the men got back into the dinghy to see if anyone else had jumped overboard.

“But they came back and there was no one that they found,” Shirley Hansen said.

Thank you for the update this is even more saddening knowing there was a child on board

Here's a description of a fiberglass yacht fire, from the captain who was awoken at 4am by someone screaming 'fire fire fire'. This is not the dive boat in question, but some idea how fast they can burn.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xD4jVO3x_E&feature=youtu.be&t=394

thank you for this link - it is a good example for us, he was thankful someone woke them up as he felt the chemical filled smoke surely would have killed them without the outside alert.