‘In that fog, my eyes would have been glued to the radar’
Friday 21st October 2011, 2:29PM BST.
SENIOR Condor officers should have had their ‘eyes glued to the radar’ to compensate for bad weather on the morning the Vitesse crashed into a French fishing boat, a radar specialist has said.
Cruise Control Ltd instructor Keith Gatehouse made the comments after a report by the French marine accident investigation bureau ruled that a lack of attention on the part of the Vitesse’s bridge crew was one of five factors that caused the fatal accident.
French fisherman Philippe Lesaulnier, a father of four and skipper of Les Marquises, died after his vessel was split in half by the impact.
‘We teach people all about using their radars properly and if you do go out when it is foggy then you always have an eye on the radar – there is no doubt about it,’ Mr Gatehouse (pictured) said.
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I am very sorry for the loss of the Fisherman but can I say, was there a radar on the Fishing Boat? why were they fishing in awful weather and in the main Shipping Channel. I have had Fishing Boats for approx 40 years, admittedly they have pushed to make a living, but, my Crew would not have been there in the conditions and not in that position. Condor have very professional crew, therefore I feel the blame at present needs to be looked at more carefully. Innocent until proven Guilty. My feelings are, no matter what COndor will be held responsible which is a totally unfair situation.
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No doubt the first of many “this would never happen to me”.
It is so easy to make these sort of comments after the event. I can guarantee that this individual has, at one point during his time at sea let his concentration lapse and did not have “his eyes glued to the radar” when he should have done.
We all “know” we should concentrate on our driving 100% of the time, but as humans everyone of us will have lapses. The dangerous ones are those who think they can’t make mistakes, so you Mr Gatehouse should look at your own procedures and standards and I would put you in a higher risk category.
I am a professional pilot and I know that I have and will make errors, the ones to watch are those who think they know everything and “would never make THAT mistake”.
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Caroline, while it is refreshing to hear a voice from the other side, there is still an underlying tone of “blame”.
We as humans have such a strong desire to find out “who is to blame”, that we are missing the point all together. These chaps on the bridge of Condor were simply in a job that puts them in an operation where they are more vulnerable to error.
What we need to do is find out the human factors which lead to this accident, and then find out what processes need to change, what systems need to change and what if anything should be done in future training programmes.
I’m still very disappointed that a fellow “professional” can come out with such a comment, “if it was me I would never have taken my eye off the radar”.
I only hope that the witch hunt mentality dies down. We’ve only got a fraction of the story, yet there are already experts out there ready to point their finger. What this man should be doing is reading the official reports (not the press who only take the juicy bits out), and looking at his own operation to decide what he can learn from it.
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Sorry people but BOTH sides are to blame for this accident. Those of you who use boats regularly and have acctually got qualifications to use them will know the IRPCS system and I believe rule 5 should be quoted in this instance
Rule 5. Look-out
Every vessel must at all times keep a proper look-out by sight (day shape or lights by eyes or visual aids), hearing (sound signal or Marine VHF radio) and all available means (e.g. Radar, ARPA, AIS, GMDSS…) in order to make a full assessment of the situation and risk of collision.
If this rule had been followed then this accident could have possibly been avoided.
from the initial accident ivestigation they have made at least 3 points where this rule was broken!
1. the fishing vessel was not keeping an eye on its radar and neither was the Condor Captain.
2. the condor was not sounding its fog horn.
3. lookouts were not posted around the bridge on the condor.
4. The condor was doing around 38(ish) knots which for those sea conditions was just asking for trouble (ok so this applies to rule six)
I thoroughly agree with Keith Gatehouse that radar sould be monitored at all times in times of inpaired visibility. As should all other avaliable means of making yourslef seen and heard
This was a terrible accident involving lose of life, which if the rules had been followed could have been avoided.
the captain of the condor made some serious errors that day…… but so did the skipper of the fishing vessel
@captain Oveur
You are indeed right we all make mistakes but people who carry other peoples lives in their hands should not make such serious errors. They go through years of training and to make such serious errors on a basic rule (if not the priamry rule to be quite honest) was wrong and unfortunately some one paid the ultimate price – with his life…………
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“Sorry people but BOTH sides are to blame for this accident.”
Well that’s a relief, so long as we have found out who to blame we can move on.
Allow me to digress, I’ll use one of your points:
“1. the fishing vessel was not keeping an eye on its radar and neither was the Condor Captain.”
The first point is that you refer to the fishing vessel as a “fishing vessel” (group), but Condor as the “Captain” (individual). I believe the entire crew on the bridge would have had a level of responsibility not JUST the Captain. If the crews were not paying attention to their radar, why not? Is there a lack of training, is there a culture within the company/industry that attracts an atmosphere which is too relaxed (on both vessels)? Does the industry insist on “error chain recognition training” as we have in the airline world. If they don’t, why not? If they do and the crew had attended was the course run adequately. If the Captain was not looking at his radar, why didn’t another member of the crew speak up and make that point, or as is often the case, was there confusion in that each thought someone else was monitoring the radar? Are First Officers/Second Officers/navigators (any member of the team) trained on how to “speak out”?
The annals of history are littered with air disasters which started as a basic break down of communication amongst crews, but is this just the society we now live in? We are actually getting worse at communicating as we evolve! Who is to blame for that? No individual that is for sure.
I could go on…………
The point I’m making is the culture we have is that of “which individual is to blame for this”, once our society has got their “scapegoat” it’s business as normal. We don’t seem to want to find out why this individual or in this case many individuals took the action they did.
“people who carry other peoples lives in their hands should not make such serious errors” – so that would be every car driver who, in your words should not make a serious mistake. But we DO!
“They go through years of training and to make such serious errors on a basic rule (if not the priamry rule to be quite honest) was wrong”
You are implying that as they are professional they should not be making mistakes. I can categorically tell you now that EVERY professional pilot I have ever flown with has made a mistake. A society which simply says “well you shouldn’t” is ignorant and asking for the impossible!
I’ll end with something I was taught during my recent CRM training, and that is on an average day the average person will make in the region of 30 errors. Our job is to make sure they don’t add up to the mother of all…………
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The particular radar in use has a auto acquire function which would have automatically tracked the radar target and if the alarms were on would have audibly alerted the officers on the bridge of the fishing vessels presence. Making this functions use mandatory in certain weather conditions may help prevent future situations like this.
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