Unless it is specified in the companies procedures, no, the Captain is not required to be on the bridge when visibility is reduced.
However, COLREGS, do require that speed is reduced. Reduced to what is dependent on conditions, but 16 knots in a traffic dense area is too fast.
Posted : 14/03/2025 5:07 pm
I have never worked for any Company, large or small, that did not require the Master to be on the bridge when in reduced visibility.
Posted : 14/03/2025 5:18 pm
@gobuchul - That's true of many companies procedures, but it's not a requirement under any rules, but is recommended in many guidelines.
As we've said though, for this to be a planned event is very far fetched. Another case of poor management, bad planning and lax watchkeeping.
Fatique is another issue, these small feeder ships run punishing schedules, and there's a realistic chance that the officer of the Watch was dog tired. Too knackered to realise that conditions and circumstances had become bad enough to warrant calling the old man, too worn out figure out an alternate route around the cluster of stationary ships, felt under pressure to manintain the course and speed to make an ETA in Rotterdam, distracted by other tasks, etc etc... hey presto another high profile incident.
Posted : 14/03/2025 8:16 pm
ratherbeintobago reacted
All ships now have a black box, the Voyage Data Recorder:
Bridge voice
Radio messages
Position course and speed
Radar imagery
ECDIS data (navigtion system)
Echo sounder
Watertight doors open/closed.
And a bunch of other stuff too. Plenty for the investigators to put together a good case for poor vessel management.
Don’t think it’s as well protected as on aircraft though? Will it have survived the fire?
Posted : 14/03/2025 8:22 pm
Pretty robust, the data capsule is normally mounted on top of the bridge, as well as data stored in the actual computer inside the accomodation. If the fire gutted the accomodation then it's going to difficult to access the stuff inside, but the bridge top one is designed to sink with the ship, so can withstand a decent beating.
Some ships also have a capsule integrated into an EPIRB, a float free emergency beacon. So possibly a thrid place to get data from.
Posted : 14/03/2025 9:35 pm
Completely agree with Seadog101. The vesselfinder track posted before shows the Solong on a straightline course broadly aiming for eastern end of the ancorage area. Looks like it missed a course change a few miles before the collision. No way was that deliberate, but stranger things happen at sea etc.
My thoughts are no malicious act, just cumulative complacency by the Solong the reason for this, and definitely criminal negligence. A regular route so used to straight lining it and dropping speed late. Poor watch keeping and lax bridge staffing. No adjustment of speed or working practice in poor vis. Add to that other possible factors such as fatigue, alcohol or maybe on a very demanding schedule.
The skipper may not have even been on watch and the first/second officer may have been running the bridge, but the skipper is still responsible.
Posted : 14/03/2025 10:14 pm
The captain's name is interesting. His first name is just a typical name which you would associate with a Russian villain, but his surname sounds unusual and not very Russian, and apparently in Spanish it can mean :
"a refusal to obey senior officers, particularly in the navy or other armed services, which is a mutiny"
Makes you think.
Posted : 14/03/2025 11:44 pm
@seadog101. If it's in your SMS documentation, then it's part of your ISM certification.
Good luck trying to argue it's just a recommendation.
It's like trying to argue a shore based ACOP is just guidance.
Posted : 15/03/2025 10:13 am
Ship's master didn't apply for bail and is remanded in custody https://www.reuters.com/world/russian-captain-involved-us-tanker-crash-appears-uk-court-2025-03-15/
Posted : 16/03/2025 10:49 am
Seems that the damage and loss of cargo isn’t as bad as first reported;
Posted : 17/03/2025 8:30 pm
She's relatively new, 2017. You can see the fire monitors still running in the photo, so there's power to emergency systems (emergency generator and at least one fire pump) still running.
Apart from the massive hole, a lot of the damage appears to be surface/cosmetic, but that really doesn't tell the whole story. Structural integrity will be seriously compromised, so towing her safely to a location that she can dry dock in will be a challenge.
Repairs/rebuild will come down to a commercial decision. I'll be surprised if she's not a total loss.
Posted : 18/03/2025 12:08 pm
On the news earlier, large clumps of plastic ‘nurdles’, little egg-like plastic objects used for moulding plastic products, which were part of the cargo are now washing ashore along the east coast of England, mostly they seem to be in clumps where the heat has caused them to glom together, but apparently jet fuel can be smelt on them, and with the nesting season for seabirds now starting, this is yet another threat to wildlife that’s being hit hard by bird flu. Humans eh, can’t live with ’em, can’t shoot ‘em! 😖
Posted : 19/03/2025 3:40 am
Houns reacted
It’s not ideal, but containers get lost overboard from ships all the time. Sometimes including nurdles - they do wash up on beaches and when not subject to fire are individual pellets so impossible to separate. Aviation fuel also gets intentionally dumped in the sea when aircraft need to make emergency landings. Again, far from ideal but it doesn’t lead to overnight mass extinction.
Both those things happen somewhere everyday and never make the media. The media reporting has the feel of being over dramatic and almost a sense of disappointment that so far the tragedy has been relatively limited.
Posted : 19/03/2025 7:50 am
A lot of whiskey in those containers near the front, all gone/ruined.
Posted : 19/03/2025 8:59 am
Sounds like the Captain did most of the damage to those alcohol bottles before the collision anyway…
Posted : 19/03/2025 9:28 am
I'd expect that if a ship load of nurdles are washed up you'll notice a bit more than the usual amount of rubbish washed up from the north sea.
It might not be an extinction level event but it's still a long way from ideal
Posted : 19/03/2025 9:45 am
but apparently jet fuel can be smelt on them
WTF sniffs floaters off the UK coast?
Posted : 19/03/2025 11:46 am
I'd expect that if a ship load of nurdles are washed up you'll notice a bit more than the usual amount of rubbish washed up from the north sea.
It might not be an extinction level event but it's still a long way from ideal
Except that:
1. Most of the containers are still on the ship
2. Not all the containers contained nurdles to start with
3. The contents of containers which were badly damaged by fire are likely to have burned off, or at the very least melted into giant lumps that aren't leaving the container
4. Any containers which were largely intact wont immediately release their entire contents in one go.
5. Shipping containers are unfortunately lost overboard fairly often anyway.
but apparently jet fuel can be smelt on them
Perhaps - but I suspect to the average "nose" melted/burnt plastic probably smells alot like that!
Posted : 20/03/2025 1:36 pm
I was suprised that the containers aren’t tied to ships. But it’s safer if they fall off in a storm. So partly submerged shipping containers are a hazard to yachts etc.
Posted : 20/03/2025 6:53 pm
Containers are secured to the ship, various devices lock them to the ship and to each other. Unfortunately, this secuing does fail fro time to time when the ship's structural integrity is compromised, or extreme weather encountered.
Containers are lost, but it is a miniscule amount when compared to the enoumous numbers that are transported without incident.
Posted : 20/03/2025 8:40 pm
WTF sniffs floaters off the UK coast?
The environmental group member who was reporting on camera could smell it while kneeling close by a large burnt clump of nurdles washed up on a beach.
poly, your seeming lack of any concern about an incident like this off the British coast isn’t really doing you any favours, you know. It comes across as just shrugging and saying “huh, so what, why give a shit, only one person died, and who cares about the environment anyway.”
Posted : 20/03/2025 10:36 pm
WTF sniffs floaters off the UK coast?
The environmental group member who was reporting on camera could smell it while kneeling close by a large burnt clump of nurdles washed up on a beach.
poly, your seeming lack of any concern about an incident like this off the British coast isn’t really doing you any favours, you know. It comes across as just shrugging and saying “huh, so what, why give a shit, only one person died, and who cares about the environment anyway.”
i wasn’t looking for “favours”. 1 person died which is a tragedy, and I’ve never suggested anything else - it’s a bit offensive to suggest I did. It’s frankly remarkable (if I was religiously inclined I might say a miracle) that there were not more casualties. It’s fantastic that there was not a major environmental disaster. That is a credit to the crew and designers of the tanker for mitigating that. There is a criminal prosecution and one of the people responsible will be tried to see if his part meets the criminal standard, as it should be. Sadly professional mariners die on a daily basis around the world so that we can have shiny new bikes, phones to argue with each other on, and other commodities. I wish that wasn’t the case, but whilst this made dramatic pictures and happened to be “close to home” this was not as rare as the thread might imply. I’m just as concerned about environmental contamination on foreign beaches as British ones.
But the important point is there was NOT a massive environmental catastrophe. Far worse stuff is happening with shipping around the world if the media want to look for it. Plenty of shit (literally and metaphorically) being discharged to rivers and seas. But the media would actually be delighted if there was a major environmental disaster because that stuff gets clicks. Of course it takes more effort from them and their readers than picking up some melted plastic on a beach.
Posted : 21/03/2025 11:28 am
The nurdle issue is a massive environmental concern in general and in connection to marine incidents in particular. The most famous recent example was the fire on the X-press Pearl that sank in shallow water near Sri Lanka in 2021 and the nurdles that were spilled caused a huge problem that is still being understood
I don't fancy this much when I tuck into my cod and chips 
Posted : 21/03/2025 1:07 pm
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