Atalanta of Chester/Hanne Knutsen trial

[Tranona]

Admittedly, after a solid week of chewing over the same facts and half facts, some of the arguments are becoming a bit extreme.

Exactly! The key "facts" in relation to the charges are currently unknown - at least to anyone here. That is why there is a court case as the two parties have different views.

Most of the contributions from the barrack room lawyers here are built on suppositions about what the facts are so are completely worthless.

Just hope that the defence gets equal coverage for their submission as the prosecution has.

 

[bedouin]

Hmmm. Let me get this right. Now the HK is in the wrong for being in a major shipping channel it cannot leave and has difficulty manoevering, and has attempted to avoid collision with a disabled power vessel and struck a racing yacht that was in the shipping channel, in a an area where special restrictions apply when large vessels are navigating and in a defined zone where they must keep clear.

Got it

In almost every collision there is blame on both sides. In this case there are three clear faults by HK
a) Not "maintaining course and speed" - which in this case means he started to turn then stopped then started again making his actions unpredictable
b) Sounding to turn to Port then turning to starboard
c) Not showing the correct day shapes (as required by the bye laws


In this case the yacht did take actions that he thought sufficient to avoid collision, but clearly he did not understand what the tanker was doing and so made the wrong decision. It seems likely that (a) and (b) above contributed significantly to his mistake and had the tanker itself stuck to the rules then the collision would not have happened. Once the tanker stopped behaving predictably then the yacht could only guess what he was going to do and in this cased guessed wrong.

There is a lot we don't yet know about what actually happened -

 

[JumbleDuck]

IANAL, and may be entirely wrong here, but isn't it the situation that the infringement of the IRPCS is criminal law...

IANALE, but I think by-laws are criminal law, the making of which has been delegated to a named authority, along with maximum applicable penalties. The difference from normal laws is, I think, that the body with the delegated authority prosecutes breaches of by-laws, rather than the CPS.

Correction from anyone who actually IAL welcome.

 

[JumbleDuck]

In almost every collision there is blame on both sides. In this case there are three clear faults by HK
a) Not "maintaining course and speed" - which in this case means he started to turn then stopped then started again making his actions unpredictable

There is an intersting issue there: can a course be curved? In other words, if the stand-on vessel is in a turn when the collision situation arises, is she obliged to keep turning at the same rate or to straighten up on her current heading in order to "maintain her course". All other things being equal, of course, and no shallows or channels being involved.

b) Sounding to turn to Port then turning to starboard

I thought the sequence of events was sounded starbord - turned starboard - sounded port - pause - sounded starboard - turned starboard.

c) Not showing the correct day shapes (as required by the bye laws

That's probably a red herring. I doubt that a yacht skipper could say "Yes, I saw the 850 ton tanker approaching but there was no day marker visible so I assumed she wasn't covered by the rules on large vessels." Anyway, when I look 9 seconds into http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUoUxzt9sI I am pretty sure I can see a black cylinder flown on the starboard side of the forward mast. It doesn't look terribly big, but then she's an awful big ship.

 

[JumbleDuck]

All the online news reports I can find call the yacht "Atlanta". Are they wrong or has an extra "a" crept into ybw.com?

 

[macd]

Is it not in the public interest that these proceedings are made available for the marine community to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest ? For free ?

No verbatim transcript is made of magistrates' court proceedings, although notes are often made and kept. Such records as are kept are normally only available to the parties involved in the case, although in adult courts the hearings themselves are of course public.

Equally it's not the business of magistrates' (as opposed to coroner's) courts to draw lessons and make recommendations. The nearest to a verbatim account available anywhere is probably that in the Daily Echo, which is free over t'interweb (link in post #1).

 

[A1Sailor]

Broadcasting (by means of a sound signal) a turn to port but not turning to port would confuse me. I'm not sure slowing the rate of turn to starboard counts as a turn to port. Depends on the timing of the various sound signals, all of which should be apparent to the court. Presumably there is more video footage than that publicly available.

 

[bedouin]

There is an intersting issue there: can a course be curved? In other words, if the stand-on vessel is in a turn when the collision situation arises, is she obliged to keep turning at the same rate or to straighten up on her current heading in order to "maintain her course". All other things being equal, of course, and no shallows or channels being involved.



I thought the sequence of events was sounded starbord - turned starboard - sounded port - pause - sounded starboard - turned starboard.



That's probably a red herring. I doubt that a yacht skipper could say "Yes, I saw the 850 ton tanker approaching but there was no day marker visible so I assumed she wasn't covered by the rules on large vessels." Anyway, when I look 9 seconds into http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUoUxzt9sI I am pretty sure I can see a black cylinder flown on the starboard side of the forward mast. It doesn't look terribly big, but then she's an awful big ship.

View attachment 35945

Should have gone to specsavers

Look on the HD version and you will see that is actually the block on the crane.

Yes - a course can definitely be curved, the stand on vessel is allowed/required to maintain her course, so in the case of a tanker following the channel then maintaining the course would have been to continue her turn. Similarly a sailing vessel can tack and so on.

The accounts I've seen don't mention the 2nd sound starboard but it may have happened.

Looking at the video again you can see from the aspect of the superstructure that at the time of collision she had barely started her turn - there is a substantial cut in the video and the section with the tanker passing Gurnard must have been some time later as she has turned about 50 degrees to starboard by then.

I must admit I find the actions of the yacht skipper totally incomprehensible

 

[lpdsn]

Hmmm. Let me get this right. Now the HK is in the wrong for being in a major shipping channel it cannot leave and has difficulty manoevering, and has attempted to avoid collision with a disabled power vessel and struck a racing yacht that was in the shipping channel, in a an area where special restrictions apply when large vessels are navigating and in a defined zone where they must keep clear.

Got it

The same shipping channel cuts through what is certainly the densest concentration of yachts in the UK and almost certainly one of the densest in the world. When the channel is not in use by large ships it is routinely thronged by yachts and MoBos - dodging other yachts would be a bit daunting for those used to quieter waters, never mind dodging the ferries and large ships. The worst week of the year is Cowes Week, which is when the accident happened. It is normal for the courses of several fleets to cross the channel.

It is not easy to get large vessels up to Southampton either as they have to turn about 150 deg to starboard to get into the Thorn Channel then about 90 deg to port to get up Southampton Water. It isn't an easy turn as the QE2 demonstrated a few years ago.

So it isn't easy for either group and the precautionary area & MPZ work well to allow everyone to co-exist in a better way than sometimes happens in smaller ports and quieter waters. It is not a simple situation so unless you understand the complexity you probably haven't got it.

It routinely works; there are millions of misses for every hit. Even with this collision there must've been several boats in the same class that would've been in a similarish position and they not only suceeded in avoiding the tanker but also seem to have suceeded in avoiding appearing on YouTube.

You could take the simplistic "What a plonker" approach, but what seems to be coming out on this thread is that he tried to avoid a collision but the actions of HK reduced the effectiveness of his actions. Even then he still almost missed. The debate is of course whether he took enough action to avoid the collision, but in the last couple of hundred yards his options would've been fairly limited with a spinnaker up and already on a tight reach. Bearing away to drop the kite would've just made things worse.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

IANAL, and may be entirely wrong here, but isn't it the situation that the infringement of the IRPCS is criminal law, and the bye-laws are civil law?

Good thought. I've no idea what flavour of law the bye-laws are but it seems likely that they won't be criminal law. I suspect you've solved that little conundrum.

 

[grumpy_o_g]

Exactly how quickly can a vessel that size change direction at that sort of speed? Serious question.

 

[JumbleDuck]

I must admit I find the actions of the yacht skipper totally incomprehensible

Me too. And by "incomprehensible" I don't mean wrong, just incomprehensible. I hope the MAIB report will bring enlightenment in due course.

PS Will check HD video in due course. Thanks for that tip.

 

[Uricanejack]

IANAL, and may be entirely wrong here, but isn't it the situation that the infringement of the IRPCS is criminal law, and the bye-laws are civil law? In that case, as far as I'm aware, you can't be charged with both in the same court because the criteria for a guilty verdict are different. Criminal law requires proof beyond reasonable doubt; civil law is only balance of probabilities. Even if he's found not guilty under the charges he's facing now, couldn't he still be charged under the bye-law at a later date? A bit like OJ Simpson being found not guilty of murder, and then facing civil charges for damages?

i supose he could. But how much actual damage did he cause. other than to his own boat. I supose the injured crew member could bring a civil case.

 

[JumbleDuck]

A further note on by(e)-laws ... the page at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byelaws_in_the_United_Kingdom

is pretty emphatic that they are part of the criminal law system. This sounds reasonable, since they involve words like "prosecution£ and "fine" rather than "suit" and "damages". I still think it may be the case that the CPS generally doesn't bring the prosecutions, and would welcome correction if that is wrong.

 

[l'escargot]

Me too. And by "incomprehensible" I don't mean wrong, just incomprehensible. I hope the MAIB report will bring enlightenment in due course.

PS Will check HD video in due course. Thanks for that tip.

How do you find turning to starboard to avoid a vessel coming the the other way that is also turning to starboard incomprehensible?

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

How do you find turning to starboard to avoid a vessel coming the the other way that is also turning to starboard incomprehensible?

That bit makes sense. But after that there was a point where the ship clearly hadn't turned to starboard as expected. At that point they were already free to carry on their way to their next mark sure in the knowledge the ship would pass behind and their course was taking them away from the ship.

Instead they kept sailing south-ish towards the ship's bow for no apparent reason long after there was any need to do so.

Some time after even that they were at a point (say) 10 boat lengths from the bow of the ship. The only reason not to turn round then was fear of a sharp turn to port wiping them out with the stern. Is it really credible that at that point they were expecting a sharp port turn even given a misleading sound signal? A sharp port would have taken it into the island, moreover it had already started the starboard turn.

So although I think there's easily enough doubt for the Atlanta's to be not-guilty, I can't see how the situation developed the way it did after the reasonable initial Starboard turn.

I start to wonder if the Atlanta's were totally distracted by something and forgot about the ship [1] or if the escort boat put real pressure on them to sail south-ish and remain on that course regardless.

There will be a reason, I'm sure. I'm less sure that we'll hear it.

[1] This would explain the seemingly unjustified charge of failing to keep an adequate lookout.

 

[l'escargot]

...or if the escort boat put real pressure on them to sail south-ish and remain on that course regardless...

I have always been interested in the exchange with the escort boat. They aren't reluctant to issue instructions and hang around long enough to ensure that they are being complied with. In this situation they appear to have had words with the yacht and then they head away across the bows of the tanker and off down it's port side with a purpose. That isn't how I would expect them to behave with a yacht that hasn't complied with their instruction that they think is about to be run down.

 

[A1Sailor]

Instead they kept sailing north-ish towards the ship's bow for no apparent reason long after there was any need to do so.

At which point were they sailing north-ish? Surely they were sailing south-ish, towards IoW?

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

At which point were they sailing north-ish? Surely they were sailing south-ish, towards IoW?

Corrected, thanks.

 

[dancrane]

At which point were they sailing north-ish? Surely they were sailing south-ish, towards IoW?

That's what I thought, too. I'm very confused, now. Or somebody is...