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Crackdown finds unsatisfactory compliance on rest hour regs

Written by Nick Blenkey
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Paris MoU Secretary General Richard Schifferli: Insufficient rest of watchkeeping personnel has caused several incidents over past years

JANUARY 22, 2015 — A Concentrated Inspection Campaign (CIC) by port state control authorities between September 1 and November  1, 2014 found “unsatisfactory” compliance with the hours of rest required by the STCW convention.

The crackdown in the Paris MoU region resulted in 16 ships (14% of detentions during CIC) being detained over the three month period as a direct result of the CIC for deficiencies related to hours of rest. Main areas of concern are hours of rest not being recorded properly and watchkeeping personnel without sufficient rest. In recent years there has been a growing concern regarding hours of rest for watchkeeping personnel.

Supported by PSC inspection results and following a number of incidents, the Paris and Tokyo MoU, as well as other MoUs, decided to organize a joint campaign to verify a list of 10 selected items against the STCW requirements.

The CIC questionnaire was completed during 4,041 inspections. A total of 912 CIC-related deficiencies were recorded as a direct result of the CIC during the 3 month period.

Paris MoU Secretary General Richard Schiferli said: “Insufficient rest of watchkeeping personnel has already caused several incidents over the past years. It may be the cause of fatigue, which can have major consequences for safety and the environment. Two watch systems are particularly vulnerable in this respect.”

During the campaign most inspections concerned general cargo/multi-purpose ships with 1,207 (30%) inspections, followed by bulk carriers with 948 (23%) inspections, container ships with 407 (11%) inspections, chemical tankers with 375 (9%) inspections and oil tankers with 325 (8%) inspections. Eleven (70%) of the detained ships were general cargo/multipurpose ships, three (19%) were bulk carriers, one a container ship and one was another ship type.

Analysis of the recorded deficiencies shows that most deficiencies relate to hours of rest not being recorded correctly in 449 cases (11%), watchkeeping personnel did not have sufficient rest in 203 cases (5%) and bridge lookout not maintained in 101 cases (3%).

A total of 21 inspections revealed that the manning level was not in accordance with the Minimum Safe Manning Document.

The flag with the highest number of CIC-topic related detentions was Moldova with three CIC-topic related detentions.

The inspections showed that a total of 1,268 ships were operating with a two watch system for the navigational watch and 13 of these ships were detained.

The CIC was a joint campaign with the Tokyo MoU. Other cooperating MoUs have followed the same routine during the campaign. The detailed results of the campaign will be further analyzed and findings will be presented to the 48th meeting of the Port State Control Committee in May 2015, after which the report will be submitted to IMO.

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