Container Ship stuck on Woodhouse Reef

[Hillmorton Scubie]

I see that a container ship has crashed into and is stuck on Woodhouse Reef today. The photo's show it is on the calm side that we normally dive.
Any News - has it sunk now ?

 

[Wookie]

Not that it matters, but this ship looks like a bulk carrier rather than a container ship. Isn't this deja vu from 2010? Does this happen often?

 

[koozemani]

A soon to be new artificial reef?

 

[Crowley]

Hmm I only saw this in the pub this evening and I am a bit perplexed...

When I saw the first video - taken by a friend of a friend - my first thought is that it's on the Eastern side (the inside), because the island in the distance is clearly Tiran. I was told that the ship had hit the outside - as in the not-usually-dived part.

For background information, the Straits of Tiran are the only navigable path from the North to the Souh of the Red Sea - behind Tiran is another island called Sanafir but the underwater topography makes deep water navigation almost impossible. The four island reefs in Tiran are - from South to North - Gordon, Thomas, Woodhouse and Jackson. Ships travelling north pass between Tiran island and the reefs, and this is called Grafton Passage. Ships travelling south use Enterprise passage between the west of the reefs and the eastern shore of mainland Sinai.

The photo above would appear to confirm my first thought that the ship is travelling north, because the land in the background is for sure the northern part of Sharm. I would also say it is unladen; she's riding high in the water - fully laden, the ship would have broken into the reef, not ridden on top of it. It's also quite rare to see an unladen ship coming South. All traffic is heading to the port of Aqaba in Jordan. There's not much point in going there otherwise.

One reason given for the crash on new year's eve 2009 was this: there are two beacons marking the island reefs in the Straits of Tiran - on Jackson in the north and Gordon a few kilometers to the south - the captain mistakenly took the north beacon to be the south beacon, and then turned too early. one would imagine that ships of this size have supercomputer GPS-based automatic navigation systems on board, but I know for a fact that a lot of them don't! Conditions look to have been pants today, but it is entirely possible that the crash is due to human misinterpretation of local navigation.

I am not on the boats at all these days but I do have a very intimate knowledge of the reefs in Tiran - any photos you can post are more than welcome.

Cheers

C.

 

[Wookie]

Snip....and then turned too early. one would imagine that ships of this size have supercomputer GPS-based automatic navigation systems on board, but I know for a fact that a lot of them don't!
Cheers

C.

Those systems (they are called ECDIS, for Electronic Chart Display and Navigation System) are not required until 2014 on all vessels over 500 tons and passenger vessels.

 

[Hillmorton Scubie]

Here's a couple of photo's

---------- Post added January 27th, 2013 at 10:20 PM ----------

 

[WheelsUSN]

Those systems (they are called ECDIS, for Electronic Chart Display and Navigation System) are not required until 2014 on all vessels over 500 tons and passenger vessels.

And those systems don't guarantee safe navigation. Just over a week ago, a US Navy minesweeper ran aground in the Sulu Sea off the Philippines while using an ECDIS. The electronic chart had the reef plotted in the wrong position and was off by about eight miles.

 

[Wookie]

And those systems don't guarantee safe navigation. Just over a week ago, a US Navy minesweeper ran aground in the Sulu Sea off the Philippines while using an ECDIS. The electronic chart had the reef plotted in the wrong position and was off by about eight miles.

And I'm sure the skipper was relieved for cause.... Crap way to tank a career. There is just no substitute for having a proper lookout. Hard to see a reef in the dark, however. A few years back a NOAA vessel smacked into French Frigate Shoals (I don't remember which island) and sunk. I have been to reefs in the southern Caribbean that were miles off using the electronic charts. Some haven't been updated since the days of Loran or earlier.

 

[WheelsUSN]

And I'm sure the skipper was relieved for cause.... Crap way to tank a career. There is just no substitute for having a proper lookout. Hard to see a reef in the dark, however. A few years back a NOAA vessel smacked into French Frigate Shoals (I don't remember which island) and sunk. I have been to reefs in the southern Caribbean that were miles off using the electronic charts. Some haven't been updated since the days of Loran or earlier.

Well, if the ECDIS had been used properly it still would have warned the crew about the reef because it was shown in the right location on other electronic charts (smaller scale) of the area but those charts don't appear to have been loaded into the system. It doesn't matter what a computer system is supposed to do or how great it can do it, if the operator doesn't use it correctly then it cant do its job correctly. If there is a human involved anywhere in the process, and there normally is, then there is the possibility of a human error screwing things up.

 

[Hillmorton Scubie]