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The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

vanityfair.com

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Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#91

Post by forgot-account »

sdhgaiojfsa wrote: post #84
oh_sigh wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a pretty bad take away - no one wanted to drive trough the hurricane. The captain thought he was further away from the storm than he was, perhaps because of his use of an outdated weather feed. A better take away might be, for important decisions, you should deeply understand the data(and importantly, it's limitations) you are using to make the decision.

The report seems to suggest that his decision to drive where he did was baffling, even with the information he had available. All his officers were telling him to do otherwise, multiple times.

He was looking at different data then they were looking at.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#92

Post by hyperpallium »

Luc wrote: post #4

I could tell from the title this was going to be written by William Langewiesche. He really knows how to spin a good yarn. All his articles and books seem to be movie-worthy. I'm not entirely convinced reality is that exciting, though.

The banter at the start reminded me of the start of Aliens. As transcript quotes, I assume it means James Cameron based it on reality.

The reality in this case was far, far more exciting than you ever want. If anything, the captain had a preternaturally professional calm.

> ship’s anemometer was in disrepair and had been for weeks

Can't measure wind; the co. didn't subscribe to hourly updates; a "software glitch" gave old reports.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#93

Post by cloakandswagger »

korethr wrote: post #50
clon wrote: post #13

> She called Davidson on the house phone and told him that the hurricane was now a Category 3. He knew that already. She proposed the escape route to the south and a smooth sail on to San Juan. He rejected her suggestion. I wonder if in the maritime world there is the equivalent of CRM (Cockpit Resource Management), as in aviation. Too many lives were lost due to 1st officer never taking over command when the error i…

One of my takeaways from the article is that the captain's confidence and willingness to do the right thing had been shaken after he'd been burned the last time he'd refused unsafe orders. I'm wondering if the 1st officer similarly faced bad consequences for doing the right thing and taking command -- mutiny charges are still a thing, aren't they?

That seemed like irresponsible speculation on Vanity Fair's part to me.

The root cause was a captain who mistakenly reacted off of 12 hour old data and ignored another source of data that contradicted it. Pretty surprising given the lengths the article goes through to impress upon the reader how "safety conscious" he was.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#95

Post by hinkley »

yread wrote: post #45
bklyn11201 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another conclusion was that a tiered subscription model that withholds life-saving information is a business I never want to be in. El Faro subscribed to the Bon Voyage System for weather updates, but they didn't subscribe to the routing guidance and always received six hour-old information. The stale data is a critical part of this story. http://www.stormgeo.com/solutions/shipping/on-board-services...

Another important part are the flashy graphics. People always trust you more with flashy graphics against a list of coordinates

As a professional curmudgeon, I have the same reaction to shiny graphics that I do to salesman I’m fancy suits: I’m not buying.

Charting data accurately is really really hard. On one team we had a guy who said charts are for asking questions, not making decisions, and I’ve found that to be a pretty safe default.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#96

Post by Stratoscope »

SeanBoocock wrote: post #85
Luc wrote: post #4

I could tell from the title this was going to be written by William Langewiesche. He really knows how to spin a good yarn. All his articles and books seem to be movie-worthy. I'm not entirely convinced reality is that exciting, though.

A great example is his treatment of Air France 447: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-...

Oh my, you weren't kidding:

On the last day of May in 2009, as night enveloped the airport in Rio de Janeiro, the 216 passengers waiting to board a flight to Paris could not have suspected that they would never see daylight again, or that many would sit strapped to their seats for another two years before being found dead in the darkness, 13,000 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. But that is what happened.

And I thought that name sounded familiar. William is the son of Wolfgang Langewiesche, author of one of the books that taught me how to fly: Stick and Rudder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stick_and_Rudder

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#97

Post by QuarterReptile »

wglb wrote: post #94
sdhgaiojfsa wrote: post #11

My big takeaway from all of this is that, given the choice between driving your boat into a hurricane and doing something else, something else should be the default.

Another conclusion is to stick to land-based activities.

Or be able to go deep underwater when things get really nasty.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#98

Post by QuarterReptile »

Analemma_ wrote: post #74
doughj3 wrote: post #23

For anyone interested in stories like these, I highly recommend "Normal Accidents" by Charles Perrow - there's an entire chapter on maritime accidents.

Seconded, Normal Accidents is one of the best books I've ever read. In addition to the maritime accidents, there are chapters on nuclear plants, chemical plants, and dams. It is a great discussion of how modern industrial accidents rarely have a single cause but instead are cascade failures of systems whose complexity has evolved beyond what we can handle, and presaged many of the messes we've got into with hyper-sca…

There's a book that seems similar to what you've described, called Atomic Accidents. It's a compelling narration of many notable mishaps in nuclear power, weapons,and research. Needless to say, it won't scratch the software itch.

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#99

Post by sdhgaiojfsa »

forgot-account wrote: post #91
sdhgaiojfsa wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The report seems to suggest that his decision to drive where he did was baffling, even with the information he had available. All his officers were telling him to do otherwise, multiple times.

He was looking at different data then they were looking at.

If that were all it was, then why are the investigators surprised by his decision-making?

Re: The Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in Decades

#100

Post by bskap »

floatingatoll wrote: post #83
SlowBro wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also note that B.V.S did appear to have a 'Hourly Update' feature that did not appear to be subscribed to. From the article, "The Coast Guard report also noted that “El Faro crew did not take advantage of B.V.S.’s tropical update feature,” which would have provided hourly updates." So hourly updates apparently were available even if not subscribed to.

There’s an interesting ethics question here: If your ship’s location places you near a hurricane, should they just quietly upgrade you for free tenporarily so that you don’t sink?

Didn't Tesla do that for cars near evacuation zones?
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