Ship carrying boats listing and abandoned in the Norwegian Sea

[Deleted member 36384]

Rigs have multiple options available to them. Primary method of evacuation is Helicopter, it’s the fastest, secondary is life boats, tertiary is access to the sea by ladders, descending devices, jumping. The inflatable life rafts may or may not be deployed. The tertiary methods are uncontrolled due to a rapid escalation of events that prevent primary and secondary abandonment. On some rigs, rig to vessel transfer is primary method: vessel pushing into dedicated sea level access platform or basket transfer by crane from rig to vessel.

The net descenders work but are very slow despite manufacturers claim. Colleagues had to abandon from a major gas release, in ice, onto the deck of an ice breaker and a claimed 30 minute abandonment was still going g some 2 hours later with lots of gas venting.

 

[newtothis]

If you do as instructed you just rattle down gently.....

Looks to be made of netting. A flat canvas-style slide would avoid the foot snatching. Also, going head first, although that would take a braver man that me.

 

[penfold]

Lifeboats kill a lot of people. 2019 two people died on one of my rigs when the hook released as it was hoisted to the parked position from a test launch. Decades ago other shift colleagues died when the thing released, again on test launch. I refuse to muster drill into a lifeboat. The inspectors can’t be trusted and the operators don’t have a clue how to use the lifeboat davit systems.

Davit-launched systems kill sailors with monotonous regularity; it's a toss-up between enclosed spaces and davit-launched lifeboats as to which extracts the greater toll. People not understanding how the thing works or failure from wrong or lack of maintenance, you're still dead.

 

[Kukri]

Davit-launched systems kill sailors with monotonous regularity; it's a toss-up between enclosed spaces and davit-launched lifeboats as to which extracts the greater toll. People not understanding how the thing works or failure from wrong or lack of maintenance, you're still dead.

Absolutely right.

 

[JumbleDuck]

If you do as instructed you just rattle down gently.....

Which is fine, but safety systems really have to cope with people who don't do as instructed, because they panic or because it's dark or because they're injured or because ... After all, if everybody did as instructed we wouldn't need seat belts in cars.

 

[Kukri]

Which is fine, but safety systems really have to cope with people who don't do as instructed, because they panic or because it's dark or because they're injured or because ... After all, if everybody did as instructed we wouldn't need seat belts in cars.

Which leads me to a pet topic: the difference between teaching and training.

I think we over use the term “training”. Very often we mean “teaching”.

I use “training” in the sense of a military drill; something practised again and again until it becomes something done without conscious thought but which is done using “muscle memory”, and which can be done when the person doing it is frightened, angry or otherwise confused.

Which is why ships do boat drills and fire drills (“Board of Trade Sports”) once a week.

 

[Frogmogman]

The Eemslift Hendrika is now safely berthed in Alesund.

Here's some photos.
Eemslift Hendrika Alongside in Ålesund - SMIT Salvage Success - Gallery – Heavy Lift News

 

[Frogmogman]

I’d be interested to have a closer look at the cradle that the sailing yacht was (is?) sitting in. if it has withstood such violent movement, it must be tremendously strong. The cradle my boat sits in in the yard looks pretty well made, but I do worry when I see how the boat sometimes is shaking in a blow.
If the yacht has survived, I imagine a thorough survey would be the least they can offer. A compensation for moral distress would be a nice gesture.

The sailing boat is still there, so as you say, kudos to whoever built the cradle.

 

[Concerto]

Here's some photos.
Eemslift Hendrika Alongside in Ålesund - SMIT Salvage Success - Gallery – Heavy Lift News

It seems they must have managed some correction to the angle of heel. Currently she look like an estimated 15 degrees, but in earlier photos during the tow it was 25 to 30 degrees.
Eemslift Hendrika Under Tow Towards Ålesund - 13.30 Update – Heavy Lift News
How those boats stayed in those cradles at that angle is quite amazing, especially that 2nd photo.

 

[Kukri]

It seems they must have managed some correction to the angle of heel. Currently she look like an estimated 15 degrees, but in earlier photos during the tow it was 25 to 30 degrees.
Eemslift Hendrika Under Tow Towards
- 13.30 Update – Heavy Lift News
How those boats stayed in those cradles at that angle is quite amazing, especially that 2nd photo.

I’m guessing, but this is an educated guess, based on a report that I saw, but cannot now find, to the effect l that the original problem was an under deck cargo shift that damaged the side shell;

I think they have pumped out the water in the hold but the cargo shift has not been sorted yet as someone will have to lift off the deck cargo and open the weather deck hatches to plumb the hold with a crane in order to do that.

 

[westhinder]

It seems they must have managed some correction to the angle of heel. Currently she look like an estimated 15 degrees, but in earlier photos during the tow it was 25 to 30 degrees.
Eemslift Hendrika Under Tow Towards Ålesund - 13.30 Update – Heavy Lift News
How those boats stayed in those cradles at that angle is quite amazing, especially that 2nd photo.

Just a detail, is that a Dyneema towline they use? It looks yellow in the pics

 

[savageseadog]

The sailing boat is still there, so as you say, kudos to whoever built the cradle.

The stowaway in the yacht was propbably wondering if he should help with the sheets.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Which leads me to a pet topic: the difference between teaching and training.

I think we over use the term “training”. Very often we mean “teaching”.

I use “training” in the sense of a military drill; something practised again and again until it becomes something done without conscious thought but which is done using “muscle memory”, and which can be done when the person doing it is frightened, angry or otherwise confused.

Which is why ships do boat drills and fire drills (“Board of Trade Sports”) once a week.

As a teacher I don't quite agree with the terminology, but I wholly endorse the sentiment. Those of us who teach are often far too ready to assume that the lessons we think have been learned have actually been learned.

 

[Kukri]

Just a detail, is that a Dyneema towline they use? It looks yellow in the pics

Yes; it will be Dyneema. Much much easier to get a floating Dyneema line on board a ship with no power than to deal with a heavy, greased, steel cable a couple of inches in diameter.

My colleagues in our tanker division have been mooring VLCCs with Dyneema for ten years now.

 

[Bajansailor]

I think that one of the salvage tugs went after the fish farm service vessel that jumped overboard - were they successful in bringing her into port as well?

Edit - I just saw in another post on Heavy Lift News that she was brought in successfully - and she looks fairly unscathed.
Eemslift Hendrika Deck Cargo, AQS Tor, Now in Port - Gallery and Video – Heavy Lift News

 

[Concerto]

I think that one of the salvage tugs went after the fish farm service vessel that jumped overboard - were they successful in bringing her into port as well?

Edit - I just saw in another post on Heavy Lift News that she was brought in successfully - and she looks fairly unscathed.
Eemslift Hendrika Deck Cargo, AQS Tor, Now in Port - Gallery and Video – Heavy Lift News

See post #64.

 

[Dipper]

How did they get tow lines secured on board the ship and the fish farm vessel?

 

[Kukri]

How did they get tow lines secured on board the ship and the fish farm vessel?

You need to get a boarding party on first. These days - usually by helicopter. In earlier times, and if out of helicopter range, by boat. Very occasionally - most notable case I can think of being Kenneth Dancy jumping from the stern of the tug “Turmoil” to the stern of the “Flying Enterprise” in January 1952 - by jumping straight from tug to casualty.

Then get a light line across. Dancy had one tied round him, but normally by heaving line, Schermuly line throwing rocket or Kongsberg gun.

The boarding party then heave in the light line which is bent on to a “messenger” rope. There may well be a light messenger followed by a heavier one. The messenger is heaved in using the casualty’s winches if she has power available, but more usually the messenger line is passed round a block or case need a bollard and sent back to the tug. The tug heaves in the messenger and in doing so brings the towline to the casualty.

Towlines used to be incredibly heavy - the make up was usually several wire tails to be turned up on the casualty’s bitts, then a length of high tensile chain to take the chafe in the fairlead, then a length of wire rope, shackled to a double nylon strop several inches in diameter which was in turn shackled to the tug’s tow wire.

As you may imagine, the salvage industry were early adopters of Dyneema. ?

You can use a Dyneema light line as the messenger and just use it to haul in the towline, which floats, making it all easy.

Carlsen (top) and Dancy, from the Turmoil:

 

[Dipper]

Thank you. I wondered how they managed it with no power and no crew. It took a brave person to get on board that ship.

 

[Kukri]

I represented the Turmoil’s last owners in “The Turmoil’s last case”. Her last Lloyd’s Form salvage. This was the late 1970s, she was named “Matsas”, and was owned by Loucas Matsas and Sons. She was well out of date and was really kept by them (very smartly) as a sort of family pet.

Anyway, a general cargo ship broke down and the Turmoil got there first and secured both her towline and the Lloyd’s Form in the traditional way.

By the late seventies LOF was usually agreed either by Telex over Radio or by exchange of cables via a shore station.

But here we had men with A Proper Sense of Tradition and the world’s most famous old tug (she was 35 by then)...

The Master of the tug signed the agreement, rolled it up, put it in a condom, attached that to the heaving line and threw it over; the Master of the casualty signed it, put it back in the condom and threw it back, hauled in the heaving line and the messenger and belayed the tow line and off they went.