Professional Skipper Magazine from VIP Publications

mnz incidents reports The summaries in the following text are taken from the monthly reports published by Maritime New Zealand. The incidents in the summary are reported by the person advising Maritime New Zealand of the accident or incident in question and may not necessarily be in accord with the findings of Maritime New Zealand following subsequent investigation. Maritime New Zealand, in maintaining reporting confidentiality, accepts no liability for the accuracy or otherwise of information provided to it by any party involved in any incident reported below or any third party providing such information. Likewise, in the preparation of the reports for publication in this magazine we accept no liability for the accuracy or otherwise of information. This report only includes those incidents reported in each monthly summary. For that reason this report does not necessarily include all reported incidents for the month and is not suitable for statistical or analytical purposes. Appropriate care should be taken when interpreting the relevant text. Injury only… Injury only… Grounding... 18 March Eastern Coromandel Peninsula Vessel: 14.3m NZ Fishing (SSM) Category: Line fishing 30 March Okere Section River Vessel: 1m Raft (SOP) Category: Adventure The force of the flow and her kicking caused a woman's knee to be dislocated. The woman had had previous kneecap injuries. She said she had put her knee back in to place but was still in pain. The guides decided to evacuate her from the river with the assistance of another rafting company. 3 April near Rotoroa Island Vessel: 13.99m NZ Passenger (SSM) Category: Hire and drive charter As a crewman was passing bins out of the fish room to another deckhand, he was speared by a piece of fractured bin lid and was cut on the underside of his wrist with damage to tendons. The vessel steamed to the coast where the injured man was transported to hospital for surgery. Contact/flip/overturn/injury only… 27 March Kaituna River Vessel: 4.3m Raft (SOP) Category: Adventure The guide was rafting over Tutea Falls and as the boat went over the falls he scraped his hand when the boat flipped upside down. First aid was administered on the river and further medical help was sought at the hospital. Injury Only… 28 March Kaituna River Vessel: 4.4m Raft (SOP) Category: Adventure While rafting Tutea Falls the raft went over the waterfall and a passenger scraped her knuckle on the right wall. The guide dropped her off at the evacuation point above Bottom Hole. The skipper walked her down to the take out point. Equipment failure/fire… 30 March Tasman Sea Vessel: 48m NZ Fishing (SSM) Category: FCFV A vessel was immobilized after an engine fire. Port Taranaki Limited was requested to send a tug to tow the vessel back to New Plymouth. The acting Harbourmaster reported that the vessel's engine broke down due to a broken bearing between the gearbox and engine. Divers failing to surface at agreed time… 30 March Kapiti Island Vessel: 4.90m NZ Diving. Category: Dive vessel Three divers failed to surface at agreed time. The skipper put out pan-pan 15 minutes after the agreed dive time was up. The owner couldn't locate the divers on the surface and a full search was initiated with coastguard and police organisation. The divers were located approximately two hours after they went missing. Propulsion failure… 30 March Mahurangi River Vessel: 11m NZ Passenger (SSM) Category: Tourism Activity Unsuccessful measures were taken to reverse a boiler that was losing water and steam. The skipper shut down the engine, closed off the fire, anchored, drew the fire and called for assistance. A motorized barge towed the vessel back to the wharf. It is believed that the problem was a faulty check valve. The problem was made worse when the skipper inadvertently set one of the sight glass valves to the wrong position when trying to check the level of water in the boiler. Upon further checking, and some retraining, those involved confirmed that the vessel can be operated safely. www.skipper.co.nz The skipper misinterpreted the south cardinal mark as meaning the danger is to the south and the others as danger to the west. He had looked at the charts the previous night but had not planned a passage. There was a chart and GPS in the cockpit but it was too late once the vessel had grounded. Flip/overturn/injury only... Mooring line failure... 31 March Waimarama Beach Vessel: 4.1m Recreational Category: Power boat/jet boat A rubber open boat flipped throwing the skipper and passenger. The engine control safety link tied to the skipper's hand did not break but his foot made contact with the running propeller resulting in a deep laceration. 4 April Taranaki Harbour entrance Vessel: 179m Foreign SOLAS (ISM) Category: Chemical tanker Grounding... 1 April Farewell Spit Vessel: 23.24m NZ Fishing (SSM) Category: Trawler The skipper went to bed at 0030 leaving the crew to finish off some fish on the deck. The boat was idling down the spit around 3-4 miles off, at 3 knots. Around 0200 the skipper was woken up and the boat was on the beach. They tried to back up but the vessel was stuck so a call was put out to maritime radio. Three vessels pulled the grounded vessel off the beach and it was towed back to Nelson. The skipper believes that the auto-pilot failed and turned the boat 90 degrees towards the spit. Despite being shown pictures to avoid confusion, crew used a messenger line to throw down to the tugs instead of the heaving line requested by the master and indicated by the captain. The messenger was too short and the tugs could not attach their lines. The pilot asked the captain later why the crew did not obey his orders, and the crew reportedly thought it would be safer to use a messenger as that is what they always do. Cargo shift... 4 April Port of Gisborne Vessel: 139m Foreign SOLAS (ISM) Category: Bulk carrier While loading more logs onto the vessel a couple of logs went into the harbour. Nobody was hurt and the crew organised a recovery boat to retrieve the logs. Propulsion failure... Contact/grounding... 5 April Cook Strait Vessel: 124.9m NZ Passenger (NZISM) Category: Ro-ro passenger 1 April Ruthe Passage Vessel: 14m NZ Passenger (SSM) Category: Fishing charter One of the owners was using the vessel for private over the Easter Weekend (not chartered). At midday the vessel hit the end of the reef in Ruthe Passage. The skipper felt he was far enough away from the marker to make a safe turn. Once the turn was made the skipper felt a slight bump, and after a few minutes the bilge alarm sounded. The skipper felt he could make it back to Chamberlains Bay and safely beach the boat. This was carried out and a temporary repair to the hull was made to re-float the vessel. The port main engine stopped. The vessel was diverted to the Northern Entrance under starboard engine. The vessel restarted the port main engine prior to entry into the Northern Entrance to Picton. Mooring line failure 5 April Napier Port 5 Wharf South Vessel: 184m Foreign SOLAS (ISM) Category: Container ship Shoreline lanyard parted during berthing operations due to a twist in the line not being removed prior to use. No injuries sustained by personnel. Electrical power failure/steering gear failure... Extreme vessel movement/capsize... Vessel: 130m Foreign SOLAS (ISM) Category: General cargo/multipurpose The vessel was backing out of the berth JA/S into the stream when the vessel experienced a blackout and steering gear failure. Power was restored. 5 April Clutha River between Ettrick and Millers Flat Vessel: 23.9m NZ Non-passenger (SSM) Category: Workboat Collision... 2 April Karori Bank Auckland Airport Vessel: 11.35m SOP Hovercraft Category: Hovercraft The hovercraft collided with an airport limits marker pole during an attempt to prevent three swans from flying towards the airport. The skipper had been informed that if there were swans located close to the airport that they were to move them away. Damage was caused to the front of the vessel and approximately 30 litres of diesel was released into the water. While still attached to the main mooring lines the vessel was repositioning a starboard lateral stern dredging anchor with the assistance of main engines. The hydraulic engine stalled and the crew was unable to feed out the stern anchor warp, which came up tight. This caused the dredge to slew to port in the fast current. The service tender was unmanned and tethered to the dredge. The dredge broke its tethers and was subsequently lost downstream and partially submerged. The hydraulic engine was restarted and the dredge secured. The service tender was recovered down river but had been damaged after passing through rapids. July/August 2013 Professional Skipper 79

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