The Australian Transport Security Bureau (ATSB) has issued an investigation report into the grounding of a bulk service in Port Hedland, Western Australia, on 9 April 2022.
What occurred
On the morning of 9 April 2022, the totally laden capesize bulk service departed its berth in Port Hedland, Western Australia, with a harbour pilot on board and 4 tugs helping. The primary tug was forged off shortly after departure, and the ship continued its passage by the port’s navigational channel. Because the pilot navigated the ship by a flip within the channel, the two shoulder tugs had been forged off and retained as passive escorts, whereas the aft tug remained tethered as an energetic escort.
Shortly after the flip was accomplished, the ship skilled a lack of electrical energy provide to all of the ship’s analogue rudder angle indicators and, a couple of minutes later, struck the western batter of the channel. The pilot manoeuvred the ship again into the centre of the channel and, with the help of further tugs and a second pilot, resumed the outbound passage and performed the ship to an anchorage outdoors port limits.
Subsequently, the ship was discovered to be taking over water in the number one and a couple of port double-bottom water ballast tanks. Surveys and inspections performed over the next days recognized substantial harm to the ship’s backside shell plating, together with hull breaches of the shipside shell plating of the broken tanks and the failure of the transverse bulkhead between the tanks. There have been no reported accidents or air pollution of the ocean because of the grounding.
Contributing components
Throughout an outbound pilotage, the monitoring motor of the vessel‘s bridge-mounted omnidirectional rudder angle indicator failed, leading to a brief circuit that tripped the frequent circuit breaker for all of the ship’s analogue rudder angle indicators, with an related lack of energy to those rudder indicators. Consequently, the bridge group assumed that the ship’s steering had failed and carried out steering failure emergency procedures.
Following the initiation of emergency procedures for a steering failure, the pilot’s manoeuvring orders, aimed toward sustaining directional management of the ship, resulted in an uncontrolled flip to port. Regardless of makes an attempt to arrest this flip, the vessel‘s port bow collided with the western aspect of the channel at a pace of about 6.1 knots.
The pilot’s determination to forged off the port and starboard escort tugs earlier than the ship handed beacons 30 and 31 was inconsistent with the port’s recognized and carried out greatest observe escort towage technique. Consequently, when the rudder angle indicator failed, the pilot was unable to make the fullest potential use of those tugs to both cut back the ship’s pace or arrest the flip to port.
The Pilbara Ports Authority’s port consumer tips and procedures didn’t replicate the most effective observe escort towage steering detailed within the port’s draft escort towage technique and enterprise continuity plan. The element of those improved towage practices, designed to scale back the chance of channel blockages, had been additionally not built-in into the Port Hedland Pilots’ security administration system and had been, consequently, inconsistently utilized by pilots.
Though the vessel’s steering and rudder angle indicator techniques complied with the relevant guidelines and laws, neither the SOLAS laws nor the foundations of the ship’s accountable classification society, Lloyd’s Register, mandated safety of the ship’s rudder angle indication techniques in opposition to a single level of failure in electrical energy provide. Nor did they require set up of audible or visible alerts to inform the bridge group of an influence failure affecting the indications.
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Supply: ATSB
