Fire on dive boat Conception in CA

[Wookie]

I was thinking that the computer room/data centers of places I have worked had Halon fire suppression systems. What is the difference here? People in a computer room are presumed to be awake and can get out quickly?

I was also thinking of sprinklers like what are in my condo. Those are obviously designed to work even in rooms where people are sleeping. If it needs city water pressure behind it, why wouldn't there simply be a pump that is connected to the outside of the boat?

I'm not trying to argue with anyone. I really don't know anything about these things. I'm just trying to understand.

So far, from what @Wookie posted, what I got was that the reason these ships don't have these kinds of suppression systems is, basically, because USCG regs don't require them. Implying that they don't have them because of cost, I guess.



It seems like water that made a lithium battery (e.g. a camera battery) fire worse, but put out the flames that had spread anywhere/everywhere else would still be a wise tradeoff?

I'm thinking of it kind of like when I have a bonfire in a field. Sparks sometimes fly out and start nearby grass on fire. I don't have to put out the bonfire in order to keep things safe and put out the stuff nearby that catches.

I have played a fair bit with sodium and potassium and water. My uncle was a chemist and liked to bring home samples... I get how lithium can react with water. But, I'm thinking that a small pile of camera batteries that catches on fire, while they get worse, soaking everything around them to keep the rest of the compartment from going up in flames might be reasonable to give people time to wake up, get out, and/or deploy the proper type of fire extinguisher?



Don't all these kinds of ships have automatic bilge pumps? So, if a fire system started pumping water into one cabin, the bilge pump would at least substantially prolong the time until the ship was flooded? Unless it was like (I think) Wookie said and the fire pump and bilge pump were one and the same.

Regardless, for fire suppression, it would only be pumping into one compartment, right? And not the kind of volume that those fire hoses shown in the pictures were pumping. If the system kicked in quickly, it shouldn't really take that much water to put out a fire, should it?

I did a Blackbeard's cruise a month ago. This really has made it real for me how likely dead I would be if we'd had a fast fire in the galley/salon area.



Also, one of the guys that was on the BB cruise with us told us that he was there to get tuned up for his 2 liveaboards in CA at the end of the month (the end of August). I'm sure he said at least one of them was with Truth. I sent him messages yesterday morning and again this morning. No response yet. I'm not looking forward to seeing the passenger manifest from the Conception.

In fact, automatic bilge pumps are prohibited. They may only be allowed in segregated bilges where shaft pockets and AC drains are, not where the nasty bilges in the engineroom are.

 

[KevinNM]

In fact, automatic bilge pumps are prohibited. They may only be allowed in segregated bilges where shaft pockets and AC drains are, not where the nasty bilges in the engineroom are.

Thought a good indication that you might want to turn them on is that you are pouring 500 gallons per minute into the hull of the boat.

 

[NickB-LA]

Something related to criminal negligence.

34 people are dead. 100% of paying customers are dead. 5/6 crew members are alive. This one isn't going to get swept under the rug.

In order to charge someone with criminal negligence, there has to be some. At this point there is no indication at this point that there is any. That's not sweeping anything under the rug, that's just the reality of the law.

 

[doctormike]

Something related to criminal negligence.

34 people are dead. 100% of paying customers are dead. 5/6 crew members are alive. This one isn't going to get swept under the rug.

I would be careful with that implication. It's not like the boat was slowly sinking and the crew escaped in the only life raft. The crew members survived and the passengers did not for one simple reason. The crew was sleeping above and the passengers were in a bunkroom below decks with the primary exit blocked by a fire. There was an emergency egress, but that was either also blocked or inadequately designed and implemented (not sure yet, but what I have seen suggests that).

So if this really was a sudden massive conflagration, I'm not sure why you would expect crew to hurl themselves to their certain deaths if there was no reasonable way of helping the passengers at that point. I wasn't there, I don't know how it went down, but trying to get help certainly would be a reasonable course of action in some circumstances I can imagine, which is what they did...

 

[runsongas]

It is relevant as long as we don't get too sidetracked with the details.

The point here is that those other two boats are floating death traps, just like the Conception, along with dozens of other dive boats docked in Santa Barbara, Long Beach, San Pedro, and San Diego.

How many times have you dived from a socal liveaboard that you are passing judgement and calling them death traps?

 

[Mr. Manfrenjensenden]

How many times have you dived from a socal liveaboard that you are passing judgement and calling them death traps?

None of us thought of them as death traps a week ago. Now the design flaws are laid bare for all to see.

 

[KevinNM]

I guess it's just hard for me to see how a fire could have spread so quickly and engulf the boat to such an extent that at least one crew member had to jump overboard in his underwear if there was a night watch. It seems as if by the time the crew was up and awake, all they could do was jump.

I'm not saying that the person on watch had fallen asleep, but it would certainly explain how the fire was not detected until perhaps too late. It was the middle of the night and darkness all around. I would think the burning of a fire, even in the early stages, would have been noticed by a person who was awake and vigilant.

LI battery fire can be very energetic. The flaming electrolyte can spray out under pressure with certain types. If there was something for them to ignite directly or via radiated heat and lots of air I can see the fire getting big pretty fast. Once you reach a certain amount of heat output everything around it will ignite.

I suspect that, if this is the suspected cause by the investigators, there will be a test fire that will astonish you in how fast it spreads.

 

[K_girl]

I remembered something about my trip in 2006. There was a hatch above the bunk near the stern area and I thought it was very odd that you had to climb into an upper bunk bed to get out. The safety briefing was not done downstairs in this area, it would have been too crowded, but these hatches may have been mentioned in the briefing upstairs. On that trip, I made it a point to find it. There was no way to lock the stairways near the bow because there was no door. So using the words "blocked" and/or "locked" for each of these exits would be speculation at this point. Here is a picture of what I believe is the escape hatch at the stern area (furthest from stairs):

Conception Hatch

• K_girl
• Sep 3, 2019
• 1

This news reports states the following: "Flames blocked an escape hatch and a stairwell leading to the sleeping area crowded with passengers on a recreational scuba diving trip."

Source: Coast Guard suspends search efforts for victims of California boat fire

 

[tbone1004]

@stuartv the problem is pouring water on that battery will make the fire worse and likely cause more things to catch on fire. Sure you can douse with water, but to the points made by @Wookie et al already, that is going to be a major issue.
We supply a lot of stuff to the marine industry through work and the fire requirements for those are FAR harder to pass than the aerospace and military requirements because of how bad fires are.

Halon isn't going to happen because it can't be made since it is a nasty CFC and hasn't been in over 20 years. When deployed, it doesn't suffocate a room like CO2 would since it is used in fairly low concentrations. More importantly, if this was a battery fire, it wouldn't do anything to stop the battery itself and even a single 18650 can cause serious issues.

 

[Ravenware]

I have been on the Conception, the stairs did not have a door. They fed right into the galley. There was a hatch mentioned in safety briefing. I suspect many passengers were asleep and never woke, they may have succumbed to smoke inhalation. If the galley was engulfed, it might not have been possible to get to the outside, both the stairs and the hatch fed into the galley, and you had to walk through the galley to get outside. It looks like, from pictures that the whole galley, and wheelhouse were ablaze. The timing is really a contributing factor, everyone asleep, who knows how bad the fire was by the time the crew awoke. Even someone awake on watch might not catch it, depending on where it began. 75’ boat is pretty long. If there is any positive thing from this, it would be review of current CA laws for charters.