Ship grounding on Barrier Reef blamed on fatigue
SYDNEY — An overtired first mate who had slept less than three hours in almost two days was partly to blame for sending a fully-laden Chinese coal ship slamming into the Great Barrier Reef last year and causing a minor fuel spill, investigators said Thursday.
The environmental damage from the grounding was largely limited to a gouge in a piece of the World Heritage listed reef, but the accident raised fears about the potential for a much bigger disaster because the reef lines one of the busiest shipping routes from Australia's coal mines and Asia.
Officials in Queensland state where the grounding occurred said Thursday that new satellite monitoring systems introduced in response to the incident would start operating in July to guard against future problems.
The Chinese-registered Shen Neng 1 strayed from a shipping lane off northeast Queensland and ran aground on April 3 last year, spilling nearly 3 tons of fuel oil and etching a scar across a coral shoal that experts say may take 20 years to heal.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau concluded in a final report released Thursday that a number of factors contributed to the accident, but the grounding ultimately happened because the chief mate failed to correctly monitor the ship's position and to alter its course when he should have.
The investigators found that the chief mate had slept just 2 1/2 hours in the 38 hours before the grounding because he was supervising the entry of the ship to port and the loading of its cargo of 20,000 tons of coal.
The chief mate failed to check the ship's position when he took over from his deputy shortly before the grounding. An hour late, he checked the ship's global positioning system and realized the ship was off course and in shallow water.
"He immediately told the duty seaman to put the ship's helm hard over to starboard, but it was too late," the report said.
The ship was eventually unloaded, refloated and towed back to China, where it was repaired.
The chief mate and other ship's officer were charged in Australia with causing the grounding, and face fines of tens of thousands of dollars. The ship's owners also could face heavy fines.
The investigators found that there was no management system in place on board the ship to ensure that officers on the bridge were fit to stand watch and that no procedures or guidance on the proper use of GPS and navigation plans.
They also said the lack of visual navigation warning signs was a safety problem that contributed to the grounding.
Queensland Premier Anna Bligh said on Thursday that a new GPS monitoring system covering the port of Gladstone, which is where the Shen Neng 1 was loaded, would start operating on July 1.
"That means these vessels will be constantly monitored and if they are in any way off course that's a matter that can be immediately addressed," she told reporters. "I think monitoring will go a long, long way into making the Great Barrier Reef a much safer place."