Muster Drill

[kazu]

1 minute ago, Seasick Sailor said:

 

Did you ever find out what happened?

 

Both times were small fires.  One in the kitchen (put out).

 

The Non - HAL cruise remained a mystery.

[Seasick Sailor]

2 minutes ago, kazu said:

 

Both times were small fires.  One in the kitchen (put out).

 

The Non - HAL cruise remained a mystery.

 

Whew! Thank goodness it wasn't an iceberg!

[Boytjie]

8 hours ago, VMax1700 said:

Why should the results be any less optimal than the previous version of sitting in Pinnacle Grill/MDR etc while listening to the Captain, or squeezed together under a lifeboat listening to the Captain while trying to shelter from the sun/rain/wind?

 

I liked the new way of doing the muster in August, but I still think gathering under the lifeboat (with or without life jacket) just made me more aware of the seriousness of it all. But for others it was often a time to chit-chat, joke around and not pay attention.

[chengkp75]

33 minutes ago, kazu said:

HAL’s makes more sense than Oceania’s.  We went to the show room, crowded with life jackets on (ugh) and NEVER EVER reported to our tender location.  Instead we would be led out of the back way of the show room.  I could just picture the mad rush.  Sorry.

 

The crew practices muster drills all the time on some of the port days IME.

Well, on Oceania, obviously the muster location was the show room, which is the whole idea of the drill, not getting into a boat.  As you said, you went to muster one time, and I'm sure that loading you into the boat was never considered by the Captain.  The passenger muster is about accountability, not boats.

 

While crew have drills, and the crew assigned to assist passengers (muster leaders, stairway guides, etc) do participate, again, they are not actually doing their job, as there are no passengers to guide or muster.

[chengkp75]

29 minutes ago, AmazedByCruising said:

 

Crew is continuously trained to be as nice as possible, and don't really look like an average guest.  🙂

 

At least in theory you could have a team of (possibly volunteer) actors in Miami whose sole job is to act like passengers, visiting a few muster stations during turn around day. Planned such that at least a certain percentage of the crew has had to cope with them in the last 12 months.

 

But, as you say, it's the Captain who can turn an accident into either a disaster or a smooth process. 

 

First off, since nearly all crew have an assigned emergency duty, who do you get to play "passengers" during muster drill, or do you shut down the entire ship (as is done for crew drills) to allow "non-muster" crew to play passengers.  And, then you are suggesting that training be reduced from 52 times a year to once a year?  

[KroozNut]

7 minutes ago, Boytjie said:

 

But for others it was often a time to chit-chat, joke around and not pay attention.

 

Not to mention the ones who were already 'three sheets to the wind' by muster drill time, who were often rude, obnoxious and didn't pay attention anyway.

[StLouisCruisers]

@Seasick Sailorone cruise on the Prinsendam the alarms rang out during the night.  The Captain immediately announced smoke had been detected on the lower decks and the fire crew was investigating.  We were told to remain calm in our rooms for the time being.  Twenty minutes later we were reassured the smoke was from one of the large washers in the laundry and there was no fire.  All had been taken care of and we could go back to sleep.  When the first announcement was made we got up and put on warm clothes and prepared ourselves as if we were going to be told we had to go to our lifeboats.  We didn't want to waste time if that is what we needed to do.  Difficult to go back to sleep after that experience but we managed eventually.  I'm glad nothing more serious happened.

[AmazedByCruising]

59 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

First off, since nearly all crew have an assigned emergency duty, who do you get to play "passengers" during muster drill, or do you shut down the entire ship (as is done for crew drills) to allow "non-muster" crew to play passengers.  And, then you are suggesting that training be reduced from 52 times a year to once a year?  

 

Not to replace the normal training, and the pax would be not be existing crew. 

 

I'm suggesting that a group of trained volunteers would visit ships once in a while to enable a drill that should resemble a real emergency more, with passengers behaving similar to what has been observed in previous actual emergencies. And then exaggerate a bit to make sure in a real situation the pax would behave better than during the training. 

 

Probably most show up, and shut up. But to prepare the crew for the worst: a few pax are panicking, a few are deaf and fast asleep, one broke his ankle, one keeps telling the crew that he's platinum and should have priority access to the tender, another faints leading to more panic, one feels he should take the lead, some are confused, some are drunk, some don't speak English, one can't leave his cabin without assistance, etc. Similar to https://www.casualtiesunion.org.uk/ . 

Edited October 14, 2021 by AmazedByCruising

[Boytjie]

8 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

It has long been known that "muscle memory" is the best training, therefore, actually participating in a drill works better than this kind of individual training. 

 

That is what I understood for our annual (or semi-annual) fire drill we do at work (office buildings); so you knew where to go and what to do. For a while after 9/11 we actually had to walk down to a muster location away from the building. And yes, some people would complain and not pay attention.

[Boytjie]

1 hour ago, KroozNut said:

 

Not to mention the ones who were already 'three sheets to the wind' by muster drill time, who were often rude, obnoxious and didn't pay attention anyway.

 

Don't get me started on that! On the charters we do, some show up in costume and act as if it is party time. Oh, and after some cocktails.

[kazu]

2 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

Well, on Oceania, obviously the muster location was the show room, which is the whole idea of the drill, not getting into a boat.  As you said, you went to muster one time, and I'm sure that loading you into the boat was never considered by the Captain.  The passenger muster is about accountability, not boats.

 

 

Well, honestly, I did not feel confident in the muster that Oceania had nor how we were all going to get out through the small entrance at the back of the show lounge.

 

At least on HAL I know where my tender/lifeboat is and my TRUE tender station.  Whether we all gather there or go there and check in, we still know where to go.

 

I now you are right in theory, but as a passenger I wasn’t comfortable at all with the procedure on O.  The back entrance of the show lounge is very small and I could envisage people fighting to get out first.  That’s just what crossed my mind at the time.  Glad we never had to worry about it.

[john2003]

For me, this is a discomforting thread. As some passengers appear not to be able to use their imagination to consider an emergency, I do think some level of discomfort is warranted. 

When we first sailed with HAL they lowered a couple of lifeboats to boarding level during the drill. Drills on another line where we mustered inside, we went out to the lifeboat with hands on shoulders of the person in front in the line.  We have gone a long way astray from these experiences.

I share the Oceania concern but this has more to do with poor design tradeoffs than the brand.

I think executives ordering megaships should be required to critique the Prinsendam evacuation off Alaska and passengers should be briefed on why frequent emergency drills are so important and how important their knowledge and behavior is to survival.

 

[nocl]

14 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

Yes, the FAA has done studies on the video presentations.  The IMO has done none on this new format for ships, as it  was brought about primarily by covid.

 

There are not only doctoral theses about emergency responses, but also computer paradigms that model "herd" response in emergencies.  It has long been known that "muscle memory" is the best training, therefore, actually participating in a drill works better than this kind of individual training.  The other aspect is that without the passenger muster drill, there is no longer any realistic crew training in "herding the cats" all at once.  Training with compliant crew standing in for unruly, and uncooperative passengers is not optimal.

 

When I say "tested in reality", I am speaking of a true emergency, where I don't foresee a good outcome.

Good point. The muster training is as much about the crew practicing their must duties on a crowded ship, as it is to.let passengers know the process.

[nocl]

5 hours ago, kazu said:

 

Well, honestly, I did not feel confident in the muster that Oceania had nor how we were all going to get out through the small entrance at the back of the show lounge.

 

At least on HAL I know where my tender/lifeboat is and my TRUE tender station.  Whether we all gather there or go there and check in, we still know where to go.

 

I now you are right in theory, but as a passenger I wasn’t comfortable at all with the procedure on O.  The back entrance of the show lounge is very small and I could envisage people fighting to get out first.  That’s just what crossed my mind at the time.  Glad we never had to worry about it.

The whole purpose is the account for the passengers and have them in a designated location. If the life boats had to be used it would not be every person fighting to get out. It would be the crew directly a number of people to a life boat from that location. With one of the purposes of the crew to control and manage the flow of people.

[HAL4NOW]

As a school teacher, I found it interrupted my insruction time to have so many drills and scenarios practiced (fire drills, earthquake drills, active shooter drills, etc.) but when we had an earthquake in February of 2001, all of the students knew what to do and nobody panicked until the parents showed up.

Some of the drills included the assumption that we were isolated from the outside world and had to fend for ourselves for up to a couple of weeks. We had food and water stored in various locations, an outside infirmary location, even a morgue. We practiced sweeping the building in an orderly fashion after going to the gathering place because some students had been 'hidden' and didn't make it to the meeting place as we exited. Certain entrances and hallways were marked as impassable during the sweep and we had to adjust to unknown routes and still cover the entire school grounds.

Like @chengkp75 said, real experience will differ from whatever drill and practice takes place. The closer the drill can be to replicating a true emergency, the better prepared a group of people will be. 

Maybe every cruise should have a practice fire drill or some other scenario just to make the cruisers more prepared.

[chengkp75]

6 hours ago, john2003 said:

I share the Oceania concern but this has more to do with poor design tradeoffs than the brand.

I think executives ordering megaships should be required to critique the Prinsendam evacuation off Alaska and passengers should be briefed on why frequent emergency drills are so important and how important their knowledge and behavior is to survival.

When a ship is designed, the locations suggested for muster stations must be presented to the classification societies for their approval.  The space must meet their requirements for lighting, ventilation, size, structural fire protection, access and egress locations and sizes, etc.  These have all been determined using crowd and crisis management computer models and paradigms that predict how crowds will react, and where problems could occur.  If a proposed space does not meet these requirements, it will either be modified to meet them, or another location found, long before the ship is even built.  This is why you will almost never see muster locations change over the life of a ship, since changes would require another analysis of the new proposed spaces.

 

Unfortunately, even when people understand that airplanes catch fire or crash, they still don't pay much attention to the safety orientation, so I don't think any briefing will help gain cooperation from cruise ship passengers.

 

And, while having a fire drill for passengers is a nice thought, first off, from a passenger standpoint it would simply look like another muster drill, since that is what it would be.  Secondly, even if announced as a drill only, the possibility of accident and injury to the passengers would be a liability that the insurers would not want to undertake.

[JRG]

On 10/14/2021 at 12:02 PM, chengkp75 said:

Not judging, just pointing out from my professional experience what problems I see with the new format muster.

 

I'm not buying this notion that the new E-muster will fail.    I'm not buying it this year and I didn't buy into it last year either.

 

In fact,   I specifically remember blowing this bad notion out of the airlock  when the CC audience was being subjected to long pompous lectures which would dribble off into subjects that were not relevant (like the thickness of the polypropylene life rafts that mariners use to train with during emergencies).

 

Its a good change and I'm glad it happened.

 

Happy Cruising Everybody!

[ontheweb]

On 10/14/2021 at 12:57 PM, rafinmd said:

Perhaps the direct training benefit is for the crew but certainly having the crew get that realistic training ultimately benefits the passengers.

 

Roy

Yes, especially if there is a real emergency and lives of passengers are saved!

[JRG]

1 hour ago, ontheweb said:

Yes, especially if there is a real emergency and lives of passengers are saved!

 

Thank you for not lecturing.

 

And Thank you for not referring to us passengers as " The Herd".   (we never forget)

 

And Thank you for umpiring softball games for 33 years,  a truly remarkable achievement!

 

 

[ontheweb]

18 hours ago, JRG said:

 

Thank you for not lecturing.

 

And Thank you for not referring to us passengers as " The Herd".   (we never forget)

 

And Thank you for umpiring softball games for 33 years,  a truly remarkable achievement!

 

 

You're welcome. 

 

I was not the one who originally brought up herding the passengers. Nor have I ever denigrated the passengers, but I do understand that to the crew the important part of the drill is to be able to react to the passengers and get them to do what is necessary.

 

I cannot say that I ever enjoyed the muster drill, but I did realize its necessity. It is different from an airplane in which if there was an emergency everyone is already gathered as opposed to being located all over the vessel.

 

And thank you for playing, without the players I never could have umpired. There were a few bad moments, but on the whole it was something I enjoyed including meeting lots of people both players and fellow officials.