Viking Sky position, adrift off Norway Coast and evacuating Passengers & Crew

[oann]

I don't normally post on these forums but I felt I had to say something to all the people critical of the captains decision to sail in this kind of weather. I have worked on small fast ferries up and down the Norwegian coast for over 30 years and still do. And funnily enough when I want a holiday I usually head for a cruise ship. Watching my beloved ocean stream by without having to lift a finger is paradise.

 

 But back to the topic. I have crossed this stretch of water many times although my main area is around Stavanger where Viking Sky was headed. Frankly if we could only leave port when it would be a hundred percent safe to put out the liferafts we would be stuck in port half the winter and people would not get to work or school or hospital and so on ( mind you the boat I work on take  130 pax so it is small ) and one of our routes are out to Kvitsøy ( look it up on a map ) which is out in the north sea. Life rafts are a last resort. We are trained to consider all eventualities including running the boat up onshore if possible to avoid putting people on liferafts. ( The boat is a catamaran which means it wont tip over to much if you do it right. )

 

My father is also a captain and has also been over Hustadvika many a time both in good and bad weather. We both agreed watching the live footage that the weather was lively but absolutely not of such a character that a ship like Sky should have had any problems dealing with it. It seems the 2 pilots onboard agreed since it did indeed sail.

As for hurtigruten not going, 30 years ago they probably would have. But these days hurtigruten have more tourists onboard in winter and are therefore a bit more mindful when it comes to passengers comfort. Would not do to throw up your 3 course dinner. Whereas before they were quite literally the life line along the coast bringing goods, mail and soforth to the scattered communities.The still do but to a lesser extent. Hurtigruten ships are also quite smaller than the Sky.

 

A black out is rare but can occur to any ship at anytime. I've been in several but only one in bad weather, and the engineer had things fixed up before we got in real trouble. 

 

My 2 cents. Don't know if it will change anything but there you have it. Heading for a vacation in april, a transatlantic and would have had no worries over it if it was a Viking ship.

 

Oann

[Heidi13]

3 hours ago, Jim Avery said:

But Andy, now that we are retired, think of the money we could make with that rig set up in a big pool in Arizona.  Lots better than a bounce house....🍺

Great opportunity, suggest we consider using water a little warmer than we have on the NW Coast. Would hate to get a chill and miss out on the refreshments. 😁🍻

[TiogaCruiser]

4 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

 

However, in a narrow channel with a 6 kt following tide, I lost the inner engine rounding a 90 degree turn. Once the tide grabbed the stern, I was unable to stop the swing, so was heading for the beach.  Dropped the stbd anchor, which slowed down setting onto the beach and brought the head towards the tide. However, I wasn't going to stop before hitting the beach (vertical cliff). Dropping a 2nd anchor creates a risk of getting the cables crossed, but the ship's head was far enough around to take a chance with dropping the 2nd anchor. Fortunately, we came around head to tide, brought up to both anchors, missing the beach by 50-100 feet, as estimated by the 2nd Officer on the Foc's'le. However, I would say this is a rare case where 2 anchors were used, as none of my fellow Masters had ever tried it.

 

That was about 20 years ago and have required the anchor a number of times since, but have only used 1 each time.

Was this something you had thought through in practice or training, or did it just unfold as a seat of the pants response?

[Host Jazzbeau]

57 minutes ago, cgolf1 said:

Been reading from the beginning and appreciate your analysis. Seems like the tone has changed a lot now since you joined the discussion.

 

Agree.  Amazing the silence from certain quarters since chengkp75 debunked all their speculation.  Cruise Critic is very lucky to have him (and our resident Captains, also active on this thread – thanks!).

[2+2]

I was wondering how they choose who would be the first off the ship and thereafter.  Did it seem like it went well.

[Hanoj]

18 minutes ago, oann said:

 

As for hurtigruten not going, 30 years ago they probably would have. But these days hurtigruten have more tourists onboard in winter and are therefore a bit more mindful when it comes to passengers comfort. Would not do to throw up your 3 course dinner. 

Passengers comfort is salient to this discussion. As a consumer I will never be acquainted enough with the demands and expertise sailing in stormy seas entails or of the attendant risks . Of necessity, I’m vulnerable and must trust the judgment of others. To me, the question of whether the Sky was capable of handling the conditions that contributed to, or perhaps caused if I understood correctly, its perils misses the point. From a business and customer service standpoint, let alone safety, did it make sense to sail in those conditions at that time? Perhaps this is why there are increasingly vocal demands for new safety standards in the media. The    $100+ billion cruise industry has been growing rapidly the past decade and incidents like the Sky’s on Saturday, no matter the cause or whether someone is culpable, are not good for business. 

 

[Host Jazzbeau]

11 minutes ago, Hanoj said:

Passengers comfort is salient to this discussion. As a consumer I will never be acquainted enough with the demands and expertise sailing in stormy seas entails or of the attendant risks . Of necessity, I’m vulnerable and must trust the judgment of others. To me, the question of whether the Sky was capable of handling the conditions that contributed to, or perhaps caused if I understood correctly, its perils misses the point. From a business and customer service standpoint, let alone safety, did it make sense to sail in those conditions at that time? Perhaps this is why there are increasingly vocal demands for new safety standards in the media. The    $100+ billion cruise industry has been growing rapidly the past decade and incidents like the Sky’s on Saturday, no matter the cause or whether someone is culpable, are not good for business. 

 

OTOH Cruise Critic is full of posts wingeing about missed ports.  "The only reason I booked this cruise was to call on X..."  You can't please everybody.

[just_dont]

Passengers comfort is salient to this discussion. As a consumer I will never be acquainted enough with the demands and expertise sailing in stormy seas entails or of the attendant risks . Of necessity, I’m vulnerable and must trust the judgment of others. To me, the question of whether the Sky was capable of handling the conditions that contributed to, or perhaps caused if I understood correctly, its perils misses the point. From a business and customer service standpoint, let alone safety, did it make sense to sail in those conditions at that time? Perhaps this is why there are increasingly vocal demands for new safety standards in the media. The    $100+ billion cruise industry has been growing rapidly the past decade and incidents like the Sky’s on Saturday, no matter the cause or whether someone is culpable, are not good for business. 
 

Then please do not cruise. Or at least stay on a river, where you won't have to worry about "stormy seas." But then you'd undoubtedly complain if low water levels necessitated a boat exchange by bus, so maybe just don't cruise.
You give the clear impression that you would be that passenger complaining of every little imperfection and making everyone else's vacation less enjoyable.

Sorry (to everyone else on CC) for venting.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

[oann]

Comfort is not the same as safety. On bad weather days our passengers are told to stay in their seats and get bounced around a bit but the fact that they are uncomfortable does not mean they are unsafe or put at an unacceptable risk. Weather is always considered and sometimes the decision is made that we won't leave today as people would be safe out at sea while onboard but not be safe if we were to try to let them off at their pier.

  Any boat ride, plane trip, car ride, train trip or any other form of transportation has it's inherent risks.  The sea is a hard taskmaster but overall cruise ships have statistically a very good safety record in modern times.  Cruise ships will relatively often cancel ports or go around severe storms, showing that they take weather into consideration. And as before, had Sky not lost engine power she would most likely have been fine. And as said engines can conk out on ships as well as in your car or on a plane. The only way to stay completely safe is to never leave your home.

[jiminyC_fan]

1 hour ago, oann said:

I don't normally post on these forums but I felt I had to say something to all the people critical of the captains decision to sail in this kind of weather. I have worked on small fast ferries up and down the Norwegian coast for over 30 years and still do. And funnily enough when I want a holiday I usually head for a cruise ship. Watching my beloved ocean stream by without having to lift a finger is paradise.

 

 But back to the topic. I have crossed this stretch of water many times although my main area is around Stavanger where Viking Sky was headed. Frankly if we could only leave port when it would be a hundred percent safe to put out the liferafts we would be stuck in port half the winter and people would not get to work or school or hospital and so on ( mind you the boat I work on take  130 pax so it is small ) and one of our routes are out to Kvitsøy ( look it up on a map ) which is out in the north sea. Life rafts are a last resort. We are trained to consider all eventualities including running the boat up onshore if possible to avoid putting people on liferafts. ( The boat is a catamaran which means it wont tip over to much if you do it right. )

 

My father is also a captain and has also been over Hustadvika many a time both in good and bad weather. We both agreed watching the live footage that the weather was lively but absolutely not of such a character that a ship like Sky should have had any problems dealing with it. It seems the 2 pilots onboard agreed since it did indeed sail.

As for hurtigruten not going, 30 years ago they probably would have. But these days hurtigruten have more tourists onboard in winter and are therefore a bit more mindful when it comes to passengers comfort. Would not do to throw up your 3 course dinner. Whereas before they were quite literally the life line along the coast bringing goods, mail and soforth to the scattered communities.The still do but to a lesser extent. Hurtigruten ships are also quite smaller than the Sky.

 

A black out is rare but can occur to any ship at anytime. I've been in several but only one in bad weather, and the engineer had things fixed up before we got in real trouble. 

 

My 2 cents. Don't know if it will change anything but there you have it. Heading for a vacation in april, a transatlantic and would have had no worries over it if it was a Viking ship.

 

Oann

Thank you.  I very much enjoyed reading your perspective.

[AL3XCruise]

6 minutes ago, Hanoj said:

Passengers comfort is salient to this discussion. As a consumer I will never be acquainted enough with the demands and expertise sailing in stormy seas entails or of the attendant risks . Of necessity, I’m vulnerable and must trust the judgment of others. To me, the question of whether the Sky was capable of handling the conditions that contributed to, or perhaps caused if I understood correctly, its perils misses the point. From a business and customer service standpoint, let alone safety, did it make sense to sail in those conditions at that time? Perhaps this is why there are increasingly vocal demands for new safety standards in the media. The    $100+ billion cruise industry has been growing rapidly the past decade and incidents like the Sky’s on Saturday, no matter the cause or whether someone is culpable, are not good for business. 

 

Passenger comfort is important, and would probably have been within company acceptable levels had the power not failed.  Stabilizers, rudders, engines, etc. are all used by the crew to reduce the impact of outside conditions, without these tools ship motion increases significantly.

 

I'm sure one of the Captains or the Chief can explain in far more detail, but having traversed similar conditions to those reported as a passenger I never once questioned the safety of the ship, the decision making of the Master, or the impact it was having on my vacation.  Certainly the motion had an impact when walking around, but we didn't deal with tumbling furniture; I'd surmise the biggest reason for this was a skilled bridge and engineering crew with access to a lot of resources.  

 

As far as business, I doubt a non-fatal accident will have a long term impact.  Historically companies have taken a short term hit even for far worse situations than this.  If something is ultimately uncovered about Viking's maintenance, for instance, I'm sure that could dog the company for several years, but at this point there is no credible evidence that something like that occurred.  

 

Also, I'd be curious what your source is for the $100 billion number... Most estimates seem to peg revenue at around $30 to $40 billion.

[RMLincoln]

How might we obtain further information of the investigation?  Timing to be expected for more information.. days, weeks, months or years? 

Will we ever hear what repercussions might befall the captain, if any?  I have not heard the captain's name, tried looking for it but maybe they are not giving that out yet to public, although I would think passengers would all have it, it has not been mentioned in the news briefs I have read.   I am concerned that there might be repercussions due to cruiseline image rather than for any formal findings of negligence.   

Many thanks to all the mariners for their thoughtful discussion points here! 

I must commend the rescue workers, as an emergency responder myself, I find their mission quite extraordinary!  No doubt to me that hovering helicopter hoist approach is so much safer than trying to land on a pitching, rolling ship (absolute horrors!), but painfully slow, as it was many years ago in the Gulf of Alaska when the old Prinsendam of Holland America Line eventually burned and sank after all souls were extracted by helicopter (read the account in the book Burning Cold; a 1986 event if I am correct.   

m--

[Heidi13]

17 minutes ago, TiogaCruiser said:

Was this something you had thought through in practice or training, or did it just unfold as a seat of the pants response?

Tough question to answer, as this was long before the days of full mission simulators, Bridge Resource Management, Human Factors, Risk Analysis,  etc.

 

Was I trained, I would definitely say yes, but my training wasn't college based, as I learned this job working on ships as a cadet and Deck Officer. I did spend 6 months at college, but that only helped to pass the exams. My training came from watching and being mentored by some excellent Masters & Officer, both on UK & Canadian ships.

 

Had I ever thought through this specific situation, no. The specific tide, traffic conditions and mechanical challenge was somewhat akin to the perfect storm. I had detailed voyage plans, safe distances off, clearing lines, go/no points, safe beaching areas and many others. I had also thought trough various emergency responses, but never to the extent I experienced. In these situations we dig deep, prioritise and deal with the priorities, while delegating other tasks to the officers.

 

Probably best summarised as a trained & experienced seat of the pants response.

 

 

[volk904]

Who know how much the quoted crew member actually knew about the ships operation but his quote saying the Lifeboats could not be lowered because of no power does not sound right to me. After all life boats standards are set to evaluate a sinking ship and in a sinking ship you lose power. Would there not be some kind of backup or method to lower the life boats on modern ships?  I am thinking a manual hand crank method of some kind?  I am not saying they should have used them in this situation because of the rough seas only that no way sounds wrong.

 

Also as more and more cruise ships go away from putting life vest in the cabins his issue about the difficulty in getting them in this case is interesting. Now I know this ship is much smaller the life boat deck is closer to the water than then larger cruise ships. I don't think waves get up to deck 5 much.

[just_dont]

How might we obtain further information of the investigation? 

https://www.aibn.no/Marine/Undersokelser/19-262?waf_client=desktop


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[SeaDog-46]

RMLincoln - Good further information is going to be hard to find in the short term.

Viking Ocean actions may crop up on there CC board.

A have seen it mentioned that the master is Finnish.  With the current facts - I can see no reason for any action being taken against him.  He saved the ship & all the passengers.  Sailing 39 hours earlier into "normal" weather - at a latitude further north than Iceland.

The officers are supplied from another management company - so he could quietly "no longer be required".

The report - in some countries there must be an interim report published in 3 months - Norway?

The full report will be published for all to read but may take over 12 months.

Just keep searching for it & bookmark listed above by just_dont.

[Heidi13]

3 minutes ago, volk904 said:

Who know how much the quoted crew member actually knew about the ships operation but his quote saying the Lifeboats could not be lowered because of no power does not sound right to me. After all life boats standards are set to evaluate a sinking ship and in a sinking ship you lose power. Would there not be some kind of backup or method to lower the life boats on modern ships?  I am thinking a manual hand crank method of some kind?  I am not saying they should have used them in this situation because of the rough seas only that no way sounds wrong.

 

Also as more and more cruise ships go away from putting life vest in the cabins his issue about the difficulty in getting them in this case is interesting. Now I know this ship is much smaller the life boat deck is closer to the water than then larger cruise ships. I don't think waves get up to deck 5 much.

Sadly many crew members have minimal, if any detailed knowledge of the safety equipment.

 

All survival craft - Lifeboats, D/L Liferafts, MES andRescue Boats must e gravity launched or capable of being launched without power.

 

Modern cruise ship lifeboats are not on gravity davits, but have stored power accumulators that are capable of pushing the davit head out for launching. The boat is then launched by lifting a brake handle, with the speed of descent limited by centrifugal brakes. They will also have manual back up in the event the stored power fails.

 

Davit launched liferafts must also be capable of operating without power. Our davits had a large stored power accumulator on the davit arm that permitted the zero power operation. Lowering was same as per liefboats. Our davits also had manual back-up

 

MES - again must be capable of operation without power. All systems are different, but they all achieve the requirement.

 

Rescue Boat - same again, must have some type of stored power to operate the davit and lowering is similar as lifeboats.

 

 

 

  

[SeaDog-46]

Thanks Heidi 13 - was about to say I only worked with gravity davits from 1964, but assumed what you confirmed above.

Another example of media reporting rubbish.

[RMLincoln]

48 minutes ago, just_dont said:

 

 

https://www.aibn.no/Marine/Undersokelser/19-262?waf_client=desktop


Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
 

 

 

41 minutes ago, SeaDog-46 said:

RMLincoln - Good further information is going to be hard to find in the short term.

Viking Ocean actions may crop up on there CC board.

A have seen it mentioned that the master is Finnish.  With the current facts - I can see no reason for any action being taken against him.  He saved the ship & all the passengers.  Sailing 39 hours earlier into "normal" weather - at a latitude further north than Iceland.

The officers are supplied from another management company - so he could quietly "no longer be required".

The report - in some countries there must be an interim report published in 3 months - Norway?

The full report will be published for all to read but may take over 12 months.

Just keep searching for it & bookmark listed above by just_dont.

I have bookmarked the above, and thank you for the time-frames of reports to be expected.  

BTW - I have been on cruise ships that had full black-outs, no power, totally quiet... restarting engines always took some time but we were in "normal" seas, not storm conditions.  Stuff happens.  

Overjoyed that all souls who were aboard V. Sky are safe, injured being treated, and hoping for the best for the Master and his crew who saved the ship, and arranged for and facilitated rescue and aid from shore, well done Norway!  Loved my Hurtigruten cruise Bergen to Kirkenes and back, great mariners in that part of the world, decedents of the Vikings!  Impressive.  

m--

[jlp879]

1 hour ago, RMLincoln said:

Will we ever hear what repercussions might befall the captain, if any?  I have not heard the captain's name, tried looking for it but maybe they are not giving that out yet to public, although I would think passengers would all have it, it has not been mentioned in the news briefs I have read.   

The Sky's captain is Bengt-Owe Gustafsson.  His picture appears in the blog entry for Corey Sandler, who was a passenger and lecturer (?) on the trip.  

 

http://sky.coreysandler.com/  scroll down to the entry

23-24 March 2019: A Night to Remember in Hustadvika

 

[SeaDog-46]

Have to sign off this forum for now as flying to Tokyo tonight from Brisbane to join Westerdam on Sunday for 28 days.

[OceanPatter]

Thank you, Chengkp75. Thank you, Heidi13.

 

Don’t know where we’d be without your expertise and patience with our queries. Hope we continue to learn from your wealth of knowledge.

 

Edited March 26, 2019 by OceanPatter

[chengkp75]

7 hours ago, AL3XCruise said:

 

Given this risk, I'm curious if variable pitch propellers would be valuable in certain situations?  Adjusting blade pitch would provide an additional method to change RPM and torque as required, but I don't know if they are responsive enough to matter in these conditions.

The big problem is that there is no room inside an azipod for the pitch changing mechanism.  This requires a larger diameter and longer shaft to accommodate the operating cylinder and shaft inside it, and a larger propeller hub to accommodate the eccentrics used to move the propeller blades.  The two methods, variable speed and variable pitch have different response times, and most ships using variable pitch will also use variable speed, to optimize the power output at a given propeller speed, but in heavy weather one method will be priority over the other as they could start fighting against each other due to response lags.

[chengkp75]

6 hours ago, cgolf1 said:

 

Been reading from the beginning and appreciate your analysis. Seems like the tone has changed a lot now since you joined the discussion. 

 

I am curious though if the tecnology is actually causing more issues than it is solving? We’re older ship designs more reliable? Computers are incredible, but I sometimes wonder if we rely on them too much. For a living I test software and XYZ robots and it sometimes seem the old designs and communication protocols while limited are more robust than the newer designs. Error handling for us can be tricky, can’t even begin to imagine the data load on a ship. 

I would definitely not say that older ships were more reliable.  Ships with less automation required larger crew, to perform manually what the automation does now, and of course this manual operation was subject to human foibles and errors.  When I started sailing 43 years ago, ships main propulsion systems were very similar to what they are now, and while the controls have gone from mechanical contact relays (electrical power creates an electromagnet which moves an iron core to close contacts to switch power, to solid state circuit boards, the same types of protection devices are used (overspeed, overtorque, over voltage, under voltage, overcurrent, etc) and these suffer from the same limitations across the electrical/mechanical interface then that they do now.  Until you can figure out how to generate power without moving a large mass to do so, there will always be a disconnect in response time between electrical demand and mechanical supply of power.

[chengkp75]

5 hours ago, RMLincoln said:

How might we obtain further information of the investigation?  Timing to be expected for more information.. days, weeks, months or years? 

Will we ever hear what repercussions might befall the captain, if any?  I have not heard the captain's name, tried looking for it but maybe they are not giving that out yet to public, although I would think passengers would all have it, it has not been mentioned in the news briefs I have read.   I am concerned that there might be repercussions due to cruiseline image rather than for any formal findings of negligence.   

Many thanks to all the mariners for their thoughtful discussion points here! 

I must commend the rescue workers, as an emergency responder myself, I find their mission quite extraordinary!  No doubt to me that hovering helicopter hoist approach is so much safer than trying to land on a pitching, rolling ship (absolute horrors!), but painfully slow, as it was many years ago in the Gulf of Alaska when the old Prinsendam of Holland America Line eventually burned and sank after all souls were extracted by helicopter (read the account in the book Burning Cold; a 1986 event if I am correct.   

m--

You would need to see if the AIBN has a website, and whether their documents are public domain.  As the USCG is an "interested party", their investigators will typically issue a report to the USCG CSNCOE (Cruise Ship National Center of Expertise), an advisory board made up of maritime professionals and marine safety experts.  They have a website for their reports, but it may take months after the AIBN investigation is complete for anything to be posted on this site.  The AIBN investigation could be over in a few weeks, or it could take months.  Unless there are criminal charges against the Captain, which I feel are unlikely, there will not be any public announcement of discipline against him.  As I've said, the ISM system does not look to cast blame on individuals, but to find faults in the system and correct those faults.  If the Captain followed the ISM policies, there can be no disciplinary action against him by the cruise line, and if they did so, he would have legal recourse against them.  Now, could they find other aspects of his performance to use against him?  Sure, happens all the time, and is part of the job.