Conception news

[rjack321]

Or so it has been alleged. Let’s wait for the report before organizing the lynching. Maybe even the trial.

Not to say that it doesn’t look likely, but at this point it’s all assumptions.

The crew admitted to being asleep almost immediately.

 

[Ministryofgiraffes]

Should add that all but 1 of them were well within their rights to be asleep...

 

[Ken Kurtis]

I really don't want to wade too deep into this nor get into a back-and-forth but some food for thought, especially since some here seem to think this is all black-and-white, cut-and-dried, and the answers are obvious:

WATCHMAN
1. No question it's on the COI of the Conception.
2. By the same token, the various CFRs that mention it, when taken together, can be somewhat confusing and even contradictory and some use the phrase "as the master sees fit."
3. Key element is not just a watchman, but at what interval or how often should they have to make a full loop or re-pass a given spot.
4. In an interview about this, a USCG crew-member said on their boat, you had to make a full loop at least once every three hours.
5. Needless to say, on a vessel the size of Conception that you'd be able to make a full loop much more quickly but the interval is not specified nor mandated.
6. The mere existence of a Roving Watchman doesn't guarantee that the outcome would have been any different. It is NOT an end-all, be-all.
7. Here are a few scenarios to be considered, all of which could have produced the same end result. The Roving Watchman could have been:
• In the bunkroom, trapped with everyone else
• In the galley, killed when the battery (allegedly) explodes
• In the engine room, doesn’t know fire is raging until he exits
• In the wheelhouse, unaware of the fire below
• There's no guarantee, even with roving watchman, outcome would have been different
8. Finally, my understanding is that Conception Captain Jerry Boylan, in his USCG interview, has said that he was awake in the wheelhouse and going to get up. So whether or not anyone was specifically assigned watch duties, the assertion that everyone was asleep in the wheelhouse may not accurately state the case.
9. And don't forget that at 2:35AM, a crew member had done a deck sweep including the galley and all was well. "Thump" was heard around 3:05-3:10 and fire discovered. Radio call went out at 3:14AM.
10. Goes back to the idea of what's the proper interval. because if you're OK with 30 minutes of so, only 30-35 minutes had passed since the galley was last checked.
11. IMHO, a watchman gives a false sense of security since they can only be in one place on the vessel at one time and can easily NOT be in a position to spot a problem, let alone do anything to mitigate or solve it.
12. A home-security type video system, where the entire vessel can be monitored in real-time from a single location through a video monitor, might be a much better solution.

It's quite common and just human nature for people to think, "If only the missing thing that didn't happen HAD happened, then the bad thing that did happen WOULDN'T have happened."
In this case, "If only there had been a night watchman, no one would have died."
And while that's a natural reaction, it doesn't mean it's correct.

RED SEA AGGRESSOR FIRE ONE MONTH LATER
Don't forget that this fire, under eerily similar circumstances, occurred one month after Conception. Similar problem with lack of a watchperson. However, I think the key take-away here was how quickly the fire spread. The passengers all commented on how fast it all happened and the video shows how quickly the boat became engulfed. Same issue with Conception. It seems that the fire spread extremely quickly, perhaps too fast for it to have been managed by the crew.

PASADENA APARTMENT THIS WEEKEND
I heard this one on KNX Newsradio the other day and it caught my ear because I thought, "That's similar." Apparently there was a fire in an apartment building in Pasadena on a ground floor apartment that quickly spread to the units above it. All three were fairly full engulfed when Pasadena Fire arrived a few minutes after the initial call. The culprit? A battery in either an exercise or electric bike that a bystander apparently saw explode and immediately set the first apartment on fire big time, and it quickly spread. So the idea of just because you might have been present when the fire started means nothing else bad would have happened also may be rooted more in wishful thinking (and understandably so) than logic.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, the NTSB will hold their public hearing on the Conception fire and present their findings and recommendations on October 20. The hearing will be live-streamed and available for public viewing. They will also release all of their documentation (literally thousands of pages) in the next week or two so you'll be able to peruse all the information they had prior to the hearing. Whenever there are links for both of those, I'll post them in a separate thread in this A&I forum.

 

[cerich]

been almost a year since I looked at Conceptions certificate, but if I recall a roving watch was to be occurring at al time there were passengers aboard, I don't recall it saying the roving watch could also be the anchor watch required by law. It may have, I truly don't recall.

If it didn't, there should have been two awake.

Should add that all but 1 of them were well within their rights to be asleep...

 

[cerich]

been almost a year since I looked at Conceptions certificate, but if I recall a roving watch was to be occurring at al time there were passengers aboard, I don't recall it saying the roving watch could also be the anchor watch required by law. It may have, I truly don't recall.

If it didn't, there should have been two awake.

Should add that all but 1 of them were well within their rights to be asleep...

 

[cerich]

I really don't want to wade too deep into this nor get into a back-and-forth but some food for thought, especially since some here seem to think this is all black-and-white, cut-and-dried, and the answers are obvious:

WATCHMAN
1. No question it's on the COI of the Conception.
2. By the same token, the various CFRs that mention it, when taken together, can be somewhat confusing and even contradictory and some use the phrase "as the master see fit."
3. Key element is not just a watchman, but at what interval or how often should they have to make a full loop or re-pass a given spot.
4. In an interview about this, a USCG crew-member said on their boat, you had to make a full loop at least once every three hours.
5. Needless to say, on a vessel the size of Conception that you'd be able to make a full loop much more quickly but the interval is not specified nor mandated.
6. The mere existence of a Roving Watchman doesn't guarantee that the outcome would have been any different. It is NOT an end-all, be-all.
7. Here are a few scenarios to be considered, all of which could have produced the same end result. The Roving Watchman could have been:
• In the bunkroom, trapped with everyone else
• In the galley, killed when the battery (allegedly) explodes
• In the engine room, doesn’t know fire is raging until he exits
• In the wheelhouse, unaware of the fire below
• There's no guarantee, even with roving watchman, outcome would have been different
8. Finally, my understanding is that Conception Captain Jerry Boylan, in his USCG interview, has said that he was awake in the wheelhouse and going to get up. So whether or not anyone was specifically assigned watch duties, the assertion that everyone was asleep in the wheelhouse may not accurately state the case.
9. And don't forget that at 2:35AM, a crew member had done a deck sweep including the galley and all was well. "Thump" was heard around 3:05-3:10 and fire discovered. Radio call went out at 3:14AM.
10. Goes back to the idea of what's the proper interval. because if you're OK with 30 minutes of so, only 30-35 minutes had passed since the galley was last checked.
11. IMHO, a watchman gives a false sense of security since they can only be in one place on the vessel at one time and can easily NOT be in a position to spot a problem, let alone do anything to mitigate or solve it.
12. A home-security type video system, where the entire vessel can be monitored in real-time from a single location through a video monitor, might be a much better solution.

It's quite common and just human nature for people to think, "If only the missing thing that didn't happen HAD happened, then the bad thing that did happen WOULDN'T have happened."
In this case, "If only there had been a night watchman, no one would have died."
And while that's a natural reaction, it doesn't mean it's correct.

RED SEA AGGRESSOR FIRE ONE MONTH LATER
Don't forget that this fire, under eerily similar circumstances, occurred one month after Conception. Similar problem with lack of a watchperson. However, I think the key take-away here was how quickly the fire spread. The passengers all commented on how fast it all happened and the video shows how quickly the boat became engulfed. Same issue with Conception. It seems that the fire spread extremely quickly, perhaps too fast for it to have been managed by the crew.

PASADENA APARTMENT THIS WEEKEND
I heard this one on KNX Newsradio the other day and it caught my ear because I thought, "That's similar." Apparently there was a fire in an apartment building in Pasadena on a ground floor apartment that quickly spread to the units above it. All three were fairly full engulfed when Pasadena Fire arrived a few minutes after the initial call. The culprit? A battery in either an exercise or electric bike that a bystander apparently saw explode and immediately set the first apartment on fire big time, and it quickly spread. So the idea of just because you might have been present when the fire started means nothing else bad would have happened also may be rooted more in wishful thinking (and understandably so) than logic.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, the NTSB will hold their public hearing on the Conception fire and present their findings and recommendations on October 20. The hearing will be live-streamed and available for public viewing. They will also release all of their documentation (literally thousands of pages) in the next week or two so you'll be able to peruse all the information they had prior to the hearing. Whenever there are links for both of those, I'll post them in a separate thread in this A&I forum.

Lots of good points there, to my train of thought, roving means moving. I'm pedantic that way in thought and when either employed as a roving watch at sea or over those that were.. it meant moving. Stop for a break every 45 mins or so for a smoke and/or coffee for less than 5 mins and back roving.

 

[KevinNM]

I linked to a youtube film by a UK captain recounting the night has was awoken by someone yelling “Fire!” and how fast the boat burned, along with bystander video. If you get stuff like the typical polyurethane foam in bench seats going in the lounge it’s very bad. Will be interesting to see what the NTBS did and what they found.

 

[stuartv]

Trying to find a guilty person all ways necessary to sooth the families grief is also sad. This law is more than 200 years old. It should have been adjusted. If they can't find anything else than to blame them with, and they are using an "obscure law from before the Civil War" it means they don't have much else to stand on.

I think the law against homicide is even older. Should it have been adjusted as well?

 

[markmud]

"as the master see fit."

That phrase does not relieve the master of his duty to his crew, the pax, and the vessel owner. A master who sees fit to violate the COI and Navigation Rules, will also become the scapegoat; rightly or wrongly. A roving watch person/anchor watch is the standard in the industry for professional mariners. Yachties? Not so much.

cheers,
m

 

[dmaziuk]

This law is more than 200 years old. It should have been adjusted. If they can't find anything else than to blame them with, and they are using an "obscure law from before the Civil War" it means they don't have much else to stand on.

All it means is whoever wrote the headline doesn't have much clue. Just like about every other headline-writer these days. As for the law itself: ain't broken, don't fix it.