Holland America Munster Drill

[awhcruiser]

On 11/8/2018 at 9:12 AM, Recruiter66 said:

I could not agree more.  I am not rushing to it this trip only to stand for 30 minutes.

And it's that attitude that keeps us who attend on time there later than we would want.

[Vict0riann]

All very interesting.  We always do exactly as told, and stand silently waiting for instructions.  And give dirty looks to the people chatting and laughing, sometimes distracting the crew.  That the drill is for the crew as well, I did not know, but you can always tell which of them are experienced in the job.

[iflyrc5]

If people can't pay attention and do what they are directed to do by the crew during a drill at the pier of a warm sunny day did you ever think how these folks will react in a real emergency with the ship listing to 15 degrees, wind blowing at 30 knots, rain and temperatures in the 30s (F)?   

[awhcruiser]

33 minutes ago, iflyrc5 said:

If people can't pay attention and do what they are directed to do by the crew during a drill at the pier of a warm sunny day did you ever think how these folks will react in a real emergency with the ship listing to 15 degrees, wind blowing at 30 knots, rain and temperatures in the 30s (F)?   

Some people think they know it all and don't have to pay attention to and/or even attend the drill.  I wish them luck.

[SJSULIBRARIAN]

1 hour ago, iflyrc5 said:

If people can't pay attention and do what they are directed to do by the crew during a drill at the pier of a warm sunny day did you ever think how these folks will react in a real emergency with the ship listing to 15 degrees, wind blowing at 30 knots, rain and temperatures in the 30s (F)?   

 

Thoughts like this always go through my mind as I am standing at a Muster Drill. I hope I will never have to find out!

[Daisyloo]

11 hours ago, Vict0riann said:

All very interesting.  We always do exactly as told, and stand silently waiting for instructions.  And give dirty looks to the people chatting and laughing, sometimes distracting the crew.  That the drill is for the crew as well, I did not know, but you can always tell which of them are experienced in the job.

 

We also do as requested, pay attention and listen to instructions.  We have on a few occasions asked people around us who were talking and obviously not taking the drill seriously,  to please be quiet so that we will all know what to do in an emergency.   They have always shut up and at least looked like they are paying attention. 

 

[rafinmd]

Chengkp75, I think there is one thing your well written post misses about HAL ships. All but the very newest (and the one under construction) have a large number of lounge chairs on the promenade deck.  I'm sure one of the things the crew will be doing during stage 2 of the emergency is stowing those chairs to make room for the passengers to stand at muster.  If people go to the muster station per-maturely, IN ADDITION to all the negative effects you cited they will be interfering with the task of preparing the muster area to accept passengers.

 

I am currently on the Grandeur of the Seas and have a couple of additional comments.  First, shortly after the Grandeur redeployed to Baltimore (about 2014) they had a fire in something like a galley.  The fire was eventually put out and the vessel made it to a nearby port, but as you say they DID have an extended stay standing under the lifeboats.  That absolutely CAN happen.

 

I also noticed something at our muster drill this cruise.  I'm sure our muster complies with all the necessary requirements but I was surprised we were told to go directly to our muster station as soon as we hear the alarm.  We were discouraged from going back to our cabins for needed meds, warm clothing, and the like.  I like HAL's system a lot better.

 

Roy

[chengkp75]

55 minutes ago, rafinmd said:

Chengkp75, I think there is one thing your well written post misses about HAL ships. All but the very newest (and the one under construction) have a large number of lounge chairs on the promenade deck.  I'm sure one of the things the crew will be doing during stage 2 of the emergency is stowing those chairs to make room for the passengers to stand at muster.  If people go to the muster station per-maturely, IN ADDITION to all the negative effects you cited they will be interfering with the task of preparing the muster area to accept passengers.

 

I am currently on the Grandeur of the Seas and have a couple of additional comments.  First, shortly after the Grandeur redeployed to Baltimore (about 2014) they had a fire in something like a galley.  The fire was eventually put out and the vessel made it to a nearby port, but as you say they DID have an extended stay standing under the lifeboats.  That absolutely CAN happen.

 

I also noticed something at our muster drill this cruise.  I'm sure our muster complies with all the necessary requirements but I was surprised we were told to go directly to our muster station as soon as we hear the alarm.  We were discouraged from going back to our cabins for needed meds, warm clothing, and the like.  I like HAL's system a lot better.

 

Roy

You are very likely correct in regards to crew clearing the deck.  Going to the muster station on deck prematurely will also interfere with the crews prepping the boats.

 

The Grandeur fire was on the aft mooring deck, near the crew galley, but had nothing to do with the galley.  And yes, they were held at muster stations for a lengthy period, and crew were relocated as some of their muster locations (for that portion of the crew assigned to "assist as directed") are at the aft end of the promenade, which was involved in the fire.  This goodly portion of the crew who are not specified an actual emergency duty (2-300 usually) are there ready to assist the special needs teams as needed to find/assist mobility challenged passengers, assist muster teams with moving passengers to alternative stations if needed, etc, and are quickly dispatched by radio.

 

HAL's system has its pros and cons, in my opinion.  While comforting to passengers to be told to get their warm clothes and medications, the reality is that if you go into the boats, warm clothing won't make much difference (though the huddled bodies will), and given the packing into the boat that makes sardines look spacious, having the ability to hold onto and take medications may not be viable either.  Getting into the boats is a definitively last ditch resort, and once you do, you are in a survival mode, and unfortunately there will be some triage in the boats.

[rafinmd]

Thanks Chengkp75.  Sobering words that I hope never to need to pay attention to in real life.

 

Roy

[AmazedByCruising]

28 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Getting into the boats is a definitively last ditch resort, and once you do, you are in a survival mode, and unfortunately there will be some triage in the boats.

 

Would it be possible to build ships that cannot sink under any circumstance? So obvious unsinkable that UNCLOS and flag states would say that you wouldn't need mustering or lifeboats as the ship is always better than a lifeboat?

 

I mean, ships rely on steel that should be able to handle an iceberg but if it doesn't there's a second layer of metal to keep the water out, and if that doesn't work there are compartments, and if that doesn't work there are lifeboats. But these are a series of "unlikely events" stacked on each other, and history shows that the unlikely is often less unlikely that what the study showed. It needed an incredible long series of unlikely things to go wrong, combined probably less likely than winning the lottery 6 times in a row, and still that's what happened to The Herald of Free Enterprise. (I think my text book on psychology mentioned at least 10 things that should happen at the same time and were deemed nearly impossible or weren't even considered, and they all happened at the same time)

 

Yet a rubber duck never sinks no matter how high the waves, how big the iceberg, how much rain and wind, or even how many torpedos shot at it. If you can build a rubber duck, it would be as reliable as gravity. 

 

 

A cruise line could spend a lot of money for ships to be a bit larger, with space all around the ship to be completely filled with polystyrene or something that doesn't burn, to effectively have a rubber duck and advertise with "no life boats", "no muster drills", "no obstructed view". Maybe even "as unsinkable as a rubber duck, even if the Captain is a show off from Italy". 

 

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, AmazedByCruising said:

 

Would it be possible to build ships that cannot sink under any circumstance? So obvious unsinkable that UNCLOS and flag states would say that you wouldn't need mustering or lifeboats as the ship is always better than a lifeboat?

 

I mean, ships rely on steel that should be able to handle an iceberg but if it doesn't there's a second layer of metal to keep the water out, and if that doesn't work there are compartments, and if that doesn't work there are lifeboats. But these are a series of "unlikely events" stacked on each other, and history shows that the unlikely is often less unlikely that what the study showed. It needed an incredible long series of unlikely things to go wrong, combined probably less likely than winning the lottery 6 times in a row, and still that's what happened to The Herald of Free Enterprise. (I think my text book on psychology mentioned at least 10 things that should happen at the same time and were deemed nearly impossible or weren't even considered, and they all happened at the same time)

 

Yet a rubber duck never sinks no matter how high the waves, how big the iceberg, how much rain and wind, or even how many torpedos shot at it. If you can build a rubber duck, it would be as reliable as gravity. 

 

 

A cruise line could spend a lot of money for ships to be a bit larger, with space all around the ship to be completely filled with polystyrene or something that doesn't burn, to effectively have a rubber duck and advertise with "no life boats", "no muster drills", "no obstructed view". Maybe even "as unsinkable as a rubber duck, even if the Captain is a show off from Italy". 

 

You're describing the "swiss cheese" model of accident prevention.  Even though Swiss cheese has holes all through it, only when all the holes line up does the cause of the problem reach the catastrophic result.  ISM and planned maintenance systems are designed to keep the holes from lining up, but there is always the possibility of the worst happening.  Nothing is absolute, there is no ship that can't sink, like there is no car that won't have an accident, or a plane that won't have a disaster, but you design so that the possibility is as low as possible.  

 

As for the Herald, there was one root cause, and the checks and balances that should have been done weren't, so that the root cause drove right through the holes to the sinking.

 

Yet, a rubber duck will sink if you puncture it.  If a torpedo hits a rubber duck, you better believe it will sink.

 

As for putting foam (typically in marine structures this is syntactic foam (metal or ceramic filled with hollow spheres)) around the hull of a ship, there is a serious problem with that.  Once you fill a space with foam, it is now inaccessible to inspection, or even NDT (non-destructive testing) like ultrasonic thickness testing to determine the structural condition of the steel and the welds.  This is one of the problem with the Duck boats (like the one that sank a few months ago in Missouri), is that the Duck doesn't have any reserve flotation (if the bilge pump fails, the duck will sink), and yet USCG will not allow filling the hull with foam as then the steel is no longer inspectable.

 

Can you build an airplane that will never fall out of the sky?  No more than you could build an unsinkable ship.

 

And that would be SOLAS, not UNCLOS.  But, even as "flawed" as ships are currently, they are still better than the lifeboats. 

[AmazedByCruising]

38 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Yet, a rubber duck will sink if you puncture it.  If a torpedo hits a rubber duck, you better believe it will sink.

 

As for putting foam (typically in marine structures this is syntactic foam (metal or ceramic filled with hollow spheres)) around the hull of a ship, there is a serious problem with that.  Once you fill a space with foam, it is now inaccessible to inspection, or even NDT (non-destructive testing) like ultrasonic thickness testing to determine the structural condition of the steel and the welds.  This is one of the problem with the Duck boats (like the one that sank a few months ago in Missouri), is that the Duck doesn't have any reserve flotation (if the bilge pump fails, the duck will sink), and yet USCG will not allow filling the hull with foam as then the steel is no longer inspectable.

 

Can you build an airplane that will never fall out of the sky?  No more than you could build an unsinkable ship.

 

And that would be SOLAS, not UNCLOS.  But, even as "flawed" as ships are currently, they are still better than the lifeboats. 

 

I'm not saying the ships are "flawed". I've felt completely safe on them, but the drills are a nuisance and I'd like a ship without lifeboats. And if the ship simply cannot sink because there's too much foam in it, I might convince others to cruise.

 

I don't understand how a Duck boat sank if it had enough foam around it, that can't have been the problem. Even if you can't inspect it, foam never lets you down. 

 

A rubber duck that is filled with foam will not sink. Puncturing, torpedos, atomic bombs, it will not sink. IMHO there's no need for inspection as foam is extremely reliable to stay afloat unless gravity stops working.

 

 

[chengkp75]

8 hours ago, AmazedByCruising said:

 

I'm not saying the ships are "flawed". I've felt completely safe on them, but the drills are a nuisance and I'd like a ship without lifeboats. And if the ship simply cannot sink because there's too much foam in it, I might convince others to cruise.

 

I don't understand how a Duck boat sank if it had enough foam around it, that can't have been the problem. Even if you can't inspect it, foam never lets you down. 

 

A rubber duck that is filled with foam will not sink. Puncturing, torpedos, atomic bombs, it will not sink. IMHO there's no need for inspection as foam is extremely reliable to stay afloat unless gravity stops working.

 

 

The duck boat did not have any foam in it.  It is not the foam that needs inspecting, it is the steel, that has an unfortunate tendency to corrode in sea water, and welds that have an unfortunate tendency to also corrode, or fail from fatigue, that need to be inspected.  These need to be inspected from both sides.  If you could make a structure that can hold as much weight as a cruise ship holds, simply out of foam, go for it, you'll make millions, but it just can't happen, as foam, at least any foam available today, does not possess the necessary structural strength to hold shape under repeated flexures caused by the sea.

 

And foam can let you down, it can and does break down with age.

 

And a rubber duck filled with foam doesn't hold anything else.  Where do the passengers go?  Even a rubber duck completely filled with foam will sink when enough weight is put on it's back.  A life jacket, which is essentially a block of foam, is only rated for a certain number of pounds of flotation, around 18-20 lbs.  This amount of flotation, coupled with the body's natural flotation, will keep your head out of water.  However, if I tie 180 lbs of steel to the life jacket, it will go down like a rock.  Leave a small air space in your rubber duck, and if you puncture it and let it fill with water, there is no guarantee it will stay afloat, it depends on how much water and how much foam is there within the duck to determine whether it stays afloat or not.

 

Most pleasure boats are made with foam filled flotation chambers, yet how many of these sink every year?  Thousands.  Why?  Because they fill with water (that space inside the boat that makes it useful and not just a block of floating foam), and the water outweighs the flotation of the foam.

 

What you are proposing would be a surfboard (a foam plank, or block) with all the equipment (engines, propulsion, etc) on top, and all the accommodation on top.  This would raise the center of gravity, to the point where the ship would roll over (how easy is it to fall over on a surfboard?).  Otherwise, if you have space in the hull (even with foam all around it), anything that starts to fill that space with water (broken sea water pipe, ship rolls on side and hull windows break allowing water in, or rolls to the point where the non-watertight doors on the promenade deck start letting water in and you get downflooding, will sink a ship when the water weighs more than the flotation.

Edited November 13, 2018 by chengkp75

[Copper10-8]

A look inside a crew-assigned life raft on Volendam during an abandon ship drill (for crew)

[rafinmd]

While my civilian brain has difficulty accepting the idea that a ship cannot be filled with sufficient foam to make it unsinkable I will trust Chengkp75 professional opinion on that (and I think I also have heard of a number of wooden shipwrecks on the bottom).  I will for a minute assume it is possible and I still don't like what I see.

 

While sinkings and major disasters happen all too often with 3rd world ferries, there have been blessedly few modern cruise ship disasters.  The only major cruise ship disaster I can think of in the 21st century is the Costa Concordia.  THE COSTA CONCORDIA DID NOT SINK.  It is not enough that a ship stays on the surface; if major parts of the ship flood, if the ship turns on it's side, or power is completely lost, the situation will be dire, even if the ship does not sink.

 

An unsinkable ship with no survival craft.  Sorry, I want no part of it.

 

I want to add that if the reason to make a ship unsinkable is to do away with the muster drill I am pretty much lacking in sympathy.  Even on a mass market ship which alternates 3 and 4 day cruises, the crew will drill at least 50% more than the passengers.  On a HAL ship doing cruises of 7 days or more, they will go through the drill more than twice as often as we do it and in far greater detail.  If they can do that for our safety I can't complain about doing it once on a cruise.

 

Roy

 

 

Edited November 13, 2018 by rafinmd
Crew

[scapel]

5 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

The duck boat did not have any foam in it.  It is not the foam that needs inspecting, it is the steel, that has an unfortunate tendency to corrode in sea water, and welds that have an unfortunate tendency to also corrode, or fail from fatigue, that need to be inspected.  These need to be inspected from both sides.  If you could make a structure that can hold as much weight as a cruise ship holds, simply out of foam, go for it, you'll make millions, but it just can't happen, as foam, at least any foam available today, does not possess the necessary structural strength to hold shape under repeated flexures caused by the sea.

 

And foam can let you down, it can and does break down with age.

 

And a rubber duck filled with foam doesn't hold anything else.  Where do the passengers go?  Even a rubber duck completely filled with foam will sink when enough weight is put on it's back.  A life jacket, which is essentially a block of foam, is only rated for a certain number of pounds of flotation, around 18-20 lbs.  This amount of flotation, coupled with the body's natural flotation, will keep your head out of water.  However, if I tie 180 lbs of steel to the life jacket, it will go down like a rock.  Leave a small air space in your rubber duck, and if you puncture it and let it fill with water, there is no guarantee it will stay afloat, it depends on how much water and how much foam is there within the duck to determine whether it stays afloat or not.

 

Most pleasure boats are made with foam filled flotation chambers, yet how many of these sink every year?  Thousands.  Why?  Because they fill with water (that space inside the boat that makes it useful and not just a block of floating foam), and the water outweighs the flotation of the foam.

 

What you are proposing would be a surfboard (a foam plank, or block) with all the equipment (engines, propulsion, etc) on top, and all the accommodation on top.  This would raise the center of gravity, to the point where the ship would roll over (how easy is it to fall over on a surfboard?).  Otherwise, if you have space in the hull (even with foam all around it), anything that starts to fill that space with water (broken sea water pipe, ship rolls on side and hull windows break allowing water in, or rolls to the point where the non-watertight doors on the promenade deck start letting water in and you get downflooding, will sink a ship when the water weighs more than the flotation.

Water can be the most powerful force in the world and it can sink anything and it can turn anything over and over.

On another note regarding so called life boat drills-- I always recommend to cruisers and crew to be sure your life vest is tried on and adjusted properly when you arrive to your cabin. An emergency is no time to try to get into a life vest for the first time in your life. For multiple people in a cabin use post notes to identify your own life vest. At the so called lifeboat drills, I never hear any statements to the effect to go to your cabin and put your life vest on and adjust it to fit. I have been on a cruise ship that hit another ship. Fortunately it was only a minor incident but the wife and I were ready.

[chengkp75]

Just a note.  The drills that passengers participate in are not "lifeboat drills".  They are "passenger muster" drills, the major purpose of them is to get passengers in limited, known, locations under crew control, where accountability can be taken.  90% of the time that passengers are sent to the muster stations in real emergencies, there is no thought whatsoever on the part of the Captain that the boats will be launched.  Muster drill is so that we know that everyone is accounted for, both passengers and crew, and the emergency teams can concentrate on the emergency and not on lost souls.  As for lifejackets, they are not of primary importance to your survival, and if actually put into the boats, you would most likely remove them for the sake of room to exist.  The crew in the emergency teams do not have their lifejackets with them while fighting a fire, and they will not have time when the Captain finally decides to abandon ship (long after the passengers are away in the boats) to go get them.  They will get into life rafts without lifejackets, and will be fine.

[doublebzz]

9 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

 As for lifejackets, they are not of primary importance to your survival,

 

Really?  Then why have them at all?

[Copper10-8]

17 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

...........................  The crew in the emergency teams do not have their lifejackets with them while fighting a fire, and they will not have time when the Captain finally decides to abandon ship (long after the passengers are away in the boats) to go get them.  They will get into life rafts without lifejackets, and will be fine.

 

That is 100% correct info by Cheng as usual. On HAL, fire teams, hose handling teams, the emergency response support team, the SCBA bottle refill team, etc. do not bring with them, or wear, life jackets when responding to a fire alarm. What might, or might not, be different on HAL vs NCL, if the Captain directs his crew to abandon ship (and the majority of crew are assigned to self-inflating life rafts, rather than lifeboats/tenders), they have the option to pick up and don a life vest stored in cabinets on boat deck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 13, 2018 by Copper10-8

[chengkp75]

Yes, John, if lifejackets are quickly available, they will get them, but if none are near the rafts, then they'll do without.  I'm assuming the last photo is the crew without specific emergency duties, who are "assist as directed".  Good to get them some basic firefighting refresher training during drill.  They may be tasked to collect extinguishers around the ship to take to the emergency teams.

 

HAL team organization looks very similar.  The 4-5 guys/gals who suit up and man the hose on the fire teams, the "BA controller" who handles getting reserve air bottles for the team, and the recorder with the board to record time on air for the team to tell them when to back out for refill.

 

I see "me" in the second photo, the "on-scene commander".  Really a mental chess match in how to deploy the 50-60 crew on the various teams to address each individual emergency in each individual location and circumstances.  Got my heart going, and stretched my logical thinking processes.

[Copper10-8]

10 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

...........................

 

I see "me" in the second photo, the "on-scene commander".  Really a mental chess match in how to deploy the 50-60 crew on the various teams to address each individual emergency in each individual location and circumstances.  Got my heart going, and stretched my logical thinking processes.

 

And then you have to do it, at times, for the U.S. Coast Guard who will be monitoring your every decision and will go over their findings during the debrief 

[POA1]

If I understand you correctly @chengkp75, those beloved, wide wrap around promenade decks are why we have outside muster drills on HAL? That makes sense from a safety perspective. 

 

 

[chengkp75]

40 minutes ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

And then you have to do it, at times, for the U.S. Coast Guard who will be monitoring your every decision and will go over their findings during the debrief 

First time I did it, was for a USCG inspection, whew.  As US flag, we had USCG inspections of safety drills every 3 months.

[Copper10-8]

1 minute ago, chengkp75 said:

First time I did it, was for a USCG inspection, whew.  As US flag, we had USCG inspections of safety drills every 3 months.

 

Lucky you! 

[chengkp75]

22 minutes ago, POA1 said:

If I understand you correctly @chengkp75, those beloved, wide wrap around promenade decks are why we have outside muster drills on HAL? That makes sense from a safety perspective. 

 

 

Precisely.  On a cargo ship, you have your muster station out on deck at the lifeboat, directly behind the air intake fans for the engine room, and the exhausts from the engines.  Hearing is very poor, much worse than conversation from ill-mannered passengers.  But, because there is sufficient space next to the boat, that is where the muster station has to be.