Unknown Sea Story lob sinks

[encarnizado]

Here's the second part.

Sea Story survivors speak out - Part 2: the rescue

Survivors of the Sea Story liveaboard disaster speak out about life rafts that were not fit for purpose and a lack of action by authorities

divemagazine.com

 

[Scuba-74]

Do you mean the "very op" that lost two boats, a number of its divers' lives and is currently out of business?

That one, and the ones offering similar product. That's how "voting with one's wallet" that a few people here advocated for, works. That's how any voting works - there are usually more than one option on the ballot, and there is nothing wrong with people choosing the ones that work for them.

 

[Johnoly]

Here's the second part.

...I wasn’t jumping. So somebody pushed me.

Holy sheet !!!

 

[TostitoBandito]

Yeesh. Egypt has been on my list for a long time, but it's gonna take them years of good faith effort with the industry there to get it to the point where it's even worth considering, in my opinion. What a shitshow. If this was an isolated freak accident that'd be one thing, but they're having boat losses like this at least every year it seems, if not more.

Unfortunately I don't see a quick way out of this mess for them. The root issue is that LOB prices there have been depressed to probably half what they "should" be by political instability and all the recent accidents. Then all these operators have to cut every cost they can (eg. all the safety things) just to break even at those rates. Prices need to come up in order for the safety issues to be seriously addressed, and the industry is gonna have to eat some empty cabins for a bit as a tradeoff for cleaning up their act. If the Egyptian authorities are serious about fixing this they'd permanently shutdown the bad actors and then help partially subsidize the maintenance/safety costs for the worthwhile operators while the market resets.

 

[Dan]

Here's the second part.

Sea Story survivors speak out - Part 2: the rescue

Survivors of the Sea Story liveaboard disaster speak out about life rafts that were not fit for purpose and a lack of action by authorities

divemagazine.com

“He was calling and calling and calling and then all of a sudden, he was talking on a phone,’ said Hissora. ‘He was talking for a long time, and then when he put the phone down, we said, “Who were you talking to, emergency?”

‘And he said, “No; management.”’

The next day, the crewmember would change his story and say he phoned ‘emergency’. Hissora says she and others heard him say ‘manager’.

‘I mean, manager is manager,’ she says. ‘Even if you don’t speak English, if you say “manager”, you don’t mean “emergency”.’”

Management is first. Safety is second. You got the priority confused, crew!

“Inside Life Raft 2, Sarah and her fellow survivors were going through the same motions as the other – checking for supplies and finding the same problems as Life Raft 1, in that they had no working lights, no food, no water, and a crew that seemed unprepared and unwilling to take action.”

Another example of safety is second.

“They found some used flares and assumed the captain – who was wrapped up ‘to his chin’ in a thermal blanket – had fired them earlier in the night.”

An example of selfish & untrained Captain.

“One of Sarah’s companions on the life raft – to whom I have spoken but who has asked to remain anonymous – said that when daybreak came, she noticed the crew at the back window of the life raft discussing the sea anchor, a small parachute-shaped device strung from a floating vessel that acts as a brake against drifting and prevents the raft from spinning.

‘They didn’t know what it was and wanted to get rid of it,’ she said. ‘I asked [the Egyptian dive guide] to explain what it is to them so they don’t untie it.”

Another example of un-trained crew!

 

[chillyinCanada]

Holy sheet !!!

To be expected and may not have been a panic response by the pusher. It may have been "I'm pushing you for your own good and the good of us all behind you".

 

[Scuba-74]

Here's the second part.

Sea Story survivors speak out - Part 2: the rescue

Survivors of the Sea Story liveaboard disaster speak out about life rafts that were not fit for purpose and a lack of action by authorities

divemagazine.com

"There were 13 people in Life Raft 2, three guests, two guides, seven crewmen and the captain – but Sarah says the captain did not assert himself as captain at any point."

This was one of the weirdest parts of my experience on another boat by the same op, a couple of weeks later. The captain never once spoke to the passengers, he was merely a driver of the boat, and likely didn't speak any English. For all intents and purposes, the boat was run by the 3 dive guides, one of them a survivor of the Sea Story. They were the only members of the crew who projected any authority or responsibility. It didn't affect the overall experience in any way, it was just bizarre.

 

[TostitoBandito]

"There were 13 people in Life Raft 2, three guests, two guides, seven crewmen and the captain – but Sarah says the captain did not assert himself as captain at any point."

This was one of the weirdest parts of my experience on another boat by the same op, a couple of weeks later. The captain never once spoke to the passengers, he was merely a driver of the boat, and likely didn't speak any English. For all intents and purposes, the boat was run by the 3 dive guides, one of them a survivor of the Sea Story. They were the only members of the crew who projected any authority or responsibility. It didn't affect the overall experience in any way, it was just bizarre.

That's what you get when they have to cut costs to the point where they can cover expenses for $1000-1500 per guest per week. They outsource all the non-diving crew, along with all the safety and maintenance, to the lowest bidder.

You get what you pay for guys. At least up to a point of diminishing returns on the very high end.

 

[Scuba-74]

They outsource all the non-diving crew, along with all the safety and maintenance, to the lowest bidder.

Makes sense. It was just strange, unlike any other vessel I've been on or the captain I've met.

You get what you pay for guys. At least up to a point of diminishing returns on the very high end.

Interestingly enough, what we got was a very decent week of diving, so I'm certainly not complaining.

 

[TostitoBandito]

Interestingly enough, what we got was a very decent week of diving, so I'm certainly not complaining.

Yeah, not saying a guest can't have a good experience with one of these operators on a given trip, but that sort of operation is just setup to fail spectacularly more often than not, and almost certainly when you most need them (like in a life and death situation). Definitely glad it worked out for you, as opposed to an accident or one of the other horror show trip reports I've seen from the Red Sea region recently.

If people want to roll the dice on these go for it, but my personal opinion is everyone should stay very far away from all but the highest quality operators in the area until Egypt gets the industry there under control (if that happens). Otherwise we're just rewarding all the irresponsible and dangerous behavior.