TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH

TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH TÀI LIỆU về cẩu XUỒNG và PHAO cứu SINH

Nederlandse Organisatie voor toegepast-natuurwetenschappelijk onderzoek / Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research Centre for Mechanical and Maritime Structures Van Mourik Broekmanweg P.O Box 49 2600 AA Delft TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 www.tno.nl An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations T +31 15 276 30 00 F +31 15 276 30 21 Date October 20, 2004 Author(s) Wolf M.J., Vredeveldt A.W Copy no No of copies Number of pages Number of appendices Customer Projectname Projectnumber 42 Nienhuis Beheer & Maritieme Consultancy BV LSA DGG Doelregelgeving 006.48268 All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced and/or published by print, photoprint, microfilm or any other means without the previous written consent of TNO In case this report was drafted on instructions, the rights and obligations of contracting parties are subject to either the Standard Conditions for Research Instructions given to TNO, or the relevant agreement concluded between the contracting parties Submitting the report for inspection to parties who have a direct interest is permitted © 2004 TNO TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Contents Introduction 2.1 2.1.1 2.1.2 2.1.3 2.2 2.2.1 2.2.2 2.2.3 2.3 2.3.1 2.3.2 2.3.3 2.4 2.4.1 2.4.2 2.4.3 Overview of Life Saving Appliances onboard merchant vessels Free fall lifeboat General description Procedures for use Subsystems Davit launched lifeboat .13 General description 13 Procedures for use 14 Subsystems .15 Raft 20 General description 20 Procedures for use 22 Subsystems .24 Man Overboard Boat (MOB)/ Rescue boat 27 General description 27 Procedures for use 28 Subsystems .29 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 Rules and Regulations 31 Introduction 31 Circumstances 34 Human aspects 35 Mechanical aspects 37 Discussion and conclusions .39 References .40 Acknowledgement 41 Approval 42 TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Introduction V&W has the intention to explore the possibilities of goal based regulations in the shipping industry The area of life saving appliances onboard sea-going vessels has been chosen as an example case This report gives an overview of available Life Saving Appliances (LSA) used onboard Dutch merchant ships and makes the objectives, implied in the SOLAS regulations explicit with respect to aspects such as embarkation, launching, release etc The LSA’s which are described are the free fall life boat, the davit launched life boat, the inflatable raft and the Man Overboard Boat (MOB) For each system, the procedure how to use it is described as well as some of the important subsystems like the davit system The Dutch fleet comprises approximately 1376 [11] ships, of which about 65% ships have a length less than 85 m Those ships can fulfil LSA requirements through inflatable rafts A rescue boat is obligatory All other ships need to have a lifeboat onboard, this can be a free fall lifeboat or a davit launched lifeboat As a backup they also need to have rafts onboard Ships build after 1986 must have totally enclosed lifeboats, ships before 1986 may also have open lifeboats The outline for this report is as follows In chapter the LSA’s are described, providing a general understanding to the readers of the systems Chapter presents the results of a study of the SOLAS rules with respect to LSA’s, including some comments with respect to the rationale behind the rules In chapter 4, some discussion and conclusions are given TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Overview of Life Saving Appliances onboard merchant vessels 2.1 Free fall lifeboat 2.1.1 General description Free fall lifeboats are located at the stern of a ship Examples of free fall lifeboats used on merchant ships are shown in Figure 2.1 and Figure 2.2 Figure 2.1Free fall lifeboat (make: Norsafe [1]) Figure 2.2 Free fall lifeboat at aft of ship (make: Norsafe) TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations The launching of a free fall lifeboat is entirely based on gravity without the use of any wire falls After the release hook is opened, the boat starts to slide along the skid, has a short free fall and enters the water Due to its forward motion, the boat sails immediately away from the ship and reaches a safe distance within seconds from the moment of release The lifeboat is boarded through an aft door with access to the seats on either side of the central aisle The seats can be front facing as well as rear facing Typical rear facing seating arrangement is shown in Figure 2.3 and Figure 2.4 Passengers are strapped into their seats with safety belts The average capacity of free fall lifeboats varies between and 90 people Figure 2.3 Typical seating arrangement in a free fall lifeboat (make Norsafe) Figure 2.4 Overview of seating arrangement in a free fall lifeboat (make Norsafe) 2.1.2 Procedures for use Launching The free fall lifeboat (Figure 2.5) is stowed in skid (1), at the stern of the ship This position at the ship ensures that even under a list of 200 and a trim up to 100, the release TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations angle is still sufficient for a safe launch If the lifeboat is launched from the sideboard, the release angle can become too small From model experiments it is known that with a too small launching angle, the lifeboat can bounce back from the water like a floater The lifeboat slides on rollers (2), which are connected to the skid, the launching ramp for the lifeboat In some designs, the lifeboat slides on Teflon plates, which are vulnerable for wear After embarkation of the passengers, the lifeboat can be launched by opening the release hook(s) This is controlled from inside the lifeboat By opening a valve, a hydraulic circuit is opened and by pumping, pressure can be build up The pressure is used to operate the release mechanism Two persons are required for this operation, one to open the valve, the other for building up the pressure In Figure 2.9 and Figure 2.10 two types of release hooks are shown, which are explained in section 2.1.3 Embarkation Embarkation into the lifeboat is via an aft door Passengers take their seat and strap themselves in Depending on the type of lifeboat, it can be necessary to strap the head as well Because persons are strapped in, it is not possible to let them wear a lifejacket, unless it is an inflatable lifejacket The lifejacket can be stowed in the lifeboat or taken from the ship and placed under the seat or on the knees during the launch It is not allowed to take any other loose objects in the boat Objects like a hammer or screwdriver can seriously harm the passengers during launch 2.1.3 Subsystems The lifeboat, davit system, release mechanism, supplementary safety options and the float free arrangement of the lifeboat are described in this section The lifeboat Most lifeboats are constructed of glass reinforced polyester or aluminium They have a special designed shape to minimise acceleration during the impact The maximum drop height is up to 35 m Typical weight of the boat with equipment varies between 3000 kg for a 23 persons boat up to 17000 kg for a 90 persons boat Davit system The free fall davit with an A-frame is shown in Figure 2.5 and Figure 2.6 Figure 2.7 shows the launching skid without an A-frame The davit system can also be used to lower the lifeboat via the wires Then the boat is hooked up to the falls (see Figure 2.12) and lowered in a controlled manner into the water This makes it possible to use the lifeboat in water with ice or other objects as well as in shallow water, where escape via a free fall is not possible TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Figure 2.5 Free fall davit with A-frame (make Ned-Deck Marine [2]) Figure 2.6 Free fall davit with A-frame, retrieval (make Ned-Deck Marine) TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Figure 2.7 Launching skid without A-frame Release mechanism Several release mechanisms are used for free fall lifeboats Three types are shortly described Type I The first type is shown in Figure 2.8 and Figure 2.9 The lifeboat is connected with a hook at the aft to a fixed frame Figure 2.8 Free fall lifeboat in skid; Release hook indicated in circle (make Fassmer [3]) TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations a) b) c) d) Figure 2.9 Free fall lifeboat release hook (make fassmer) a) connection to fixed structure; b) release hook in stowed position; c) release hook in stowed position; d) close up of release hook prior to release From inside the lifeboat, a cam (1, Figure 2.9 d)) can be turned by hydraulic pressure The hook (2) is free to turn round its hinge (4) and the shackle (3), which is connected to the fixed frame, is released The boat is able to slide down the skid Type II The second type is the so called twist lock system shown in Figure 2.10 It is positioned in the centre at the aft of the lifeboat TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 10 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations a) b) c) Figure 2.10 Twist lock; free fall lifeboat release mechanism (make Verhoeff [4]) a)twist lock hook; b) lifeboat in stowed position; c) sketch of working principle In stowed position, the twist lock prevents the lifeboat from sliding The twist lock can be turned 900 from inside the lifeboat by hydraulic pressure In this new position, the lifeboat is released and can slide along the skid Type III For the third type an hydraulic pump lifts the aft of the boat until a hook disengages the securing bar on the davit The boat is then free to fall The company Norsafe uses this type of release mechanism Retrieval The free fall davit system has an hydraulic driven A-frame construction and an hydraulic driven winch In Figure 2.6 the position of the A-frame is shown while in stowed position and while in lifting position The retrieval of the lifeboat is done by falls, which need to be connected to the off-load hooks at the lifeboat An example of the hook is shown in Figure 2.11 The design of the retrieval construction can e.g be a 3-point sling with or without a spreader Figure 2.12 shows the lifeboat retrieval with the 3-point sling with a spreader TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 28 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Figure 2.38 Man Overboard Boat/ rescue boat in action Figure 2.39 Man overboard Boat/ rescue boat (make Ernst Hatecke [10]) Lifting of the lifeboat is normally by a davit with a single point arrangement The most common davit type is the slewing davit, which will be described in section 2.4.3 2.4.2 Procedures for use The rescue boat is hooked up to the automatic release hook (1, Figure 2.41), as seen in Figure 2.36, while in stowage position One wire fall (2) is used for lowering and hoisting the rescue boat The rescue boat is slewed outside the ship manually or by stored power (3) Lowering is done by gravitational forces A centrifugal brake is located within the winch drum (4) This brake controls the speed of descent for the rescue boat The lowering starts when a brake (5) outside the winch is released This can be done by remote control from inside the boat or from a position at the ship Before lowering, the painter line must be connected to the ship The painter line is used to prevent the boat from turning round its single fall while descending and for controlling the position of the boat while waterborne Just before becoming waterborne, the automatic release hook must be set by pulling the red hand grip (6) (Figure 2.36) As soon as the boat is in the water and the load in the hook is below a predefined value, the release hook opens automatically The lowering and release of the rescue boat must be possible up to a headway speed of the mother ship of knots TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 29 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations For retrieval, the rescue boat manoeuvres next to the ship First the painter line must be connected to the rescue boat Then the hook (1) is connected to the boat and the hoisting can start The winch for hoisting is often electrically driven If necessary, the winch can also be operated manually The total time for retrieval may not exceed minutes 2.4.3 Subsystems The boat The man overboard boat/ rescue boat is made of glass fibre reinforced plastic Typical dimensions are about 4,50 x 1,90 m overall Number of passengers is persons Minimum sailing speed is knots For lowering and hoisting the boat can be provided with a single hoisting pillar (see Figure 2.39) or a 3-point sling Davit For the lowering and hoisting of rescue boats, the most common davit is the slewing davit Two types are shown in Figure 2.40 and Figure 2.41 Figure 2.40 Slewing Davit system for Rescue Boat (make Ned-Deck Marine); Manual slewing, electrical driven winch for hoisting TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 30 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Lowering Slewing Figure 2.41 Slewing Davit system for Rescue Boat (make Ned-Deck Marine); Stored power for slewing, electrical driven winch for hoisting The davit is welded or bolted to the deck Typical working radius is about 3.5 m The davit has an inner and outer column The inner column can be flanged to the deck foundation column The outer pillar can be flanged to the boom Both columns are fitted with bearings The slewing operation is performed by a worm gear A non-rotating wire rope runs from the winch drum to the suspension hook TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 31 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Rules and Regulations 3.1 Introduction There are two consolidated documents, issued by IMO, related to life saving appliances (1) Chapter III of the SOLAS [14] describes requirements for life saving appliances The document gives definitions of the various systems and subsystems It states requirements with respect to LSA’s for various ship types In general requirements are described for hardware, manning and training (2) The booklet Life-Saving Appliances [15] copies chapter III of the SOLAS book However descriptions and specifications are much more precise Moreover the requirements are presented in an orderly fashion This part is called the International Life-Saving Appliances Code (LSA Code), Resolution MSC.48(66) The second part of the booklet, Revised recommendations of life-saving appliances, resolution MSC.81(70), describes how proto type Life-Saving Appliances should be tested and evaluated in case of novel designs It is noteworthy that proto-type testing is recommended in realistic sea states Moreover production and installation tests are specified Because of the limited scope of the project, the LSA code has not been considered Likewise the section on testing of life-saving appliances could not be considered either When the approach followed in this project is considered useful, it is proposed to analyse these documents likewise An attempt has been made to identify the rationale behind the regulations It is believed that the process of developing goal-based regulations may benefit from such identification The work done in this respect was focused on Chapter III of the SOLAS book Three aspects play a role with regard to LSA’s and the rationale behind the associated requirements: ? Circumstances, ? Human aspects, ? Mechanical aspects Each of these aspects can be further characterised Circumstances are characterised by weather, sea state, ship characteristics and long term decay Human aspects can be further specified by physical force/power, sensory perception and intellectual abilities Moreover, while in a passive mode, physical loads on the body, e.g temperature, humidity and psychological aspect are also relevant Finally there are mechanical aspects, which can be subdivided into global mechanical behaviour and local mechanics The global behaviour relates to issues such relative motions between boat and ship while local mechanics refer to items such as the mechanical reliability of a release hook TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 32 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Relevant regulations in chapter III from the SOLAS book have been considered explicitly with respect to these aspects and characterisations To this purpose a matrix has been made where the first column states the various regulations and sections, while the first row states the characterizations Please refer to Figure 3.1 The matrix is used to identify where regulations can be linked explicitly to the characterizations Where possible the rationale behind the regulations is described On an intuitive basis a rating has been given for each cell, within the matrix, i.e link Red means that substantial improvements of the regulation are possible, green means that the situation is, in general, satisfactory Yellow means that improvements of the regulation are possible, however the urgency is rated as not very high TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 33 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Figure 3.1 Life saving appliances related regulations in SOLAS 2001 versus aspects TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 34 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations 3.2 Circumstances Weather It is interesting to see that only in regulation 24 reference is made to weather conditions The intention of the regulation is unclear, e.g the relation between weather and stowage height does not seem obvious For that reason colour code yellow is used Living circumstances inside a lifeboat/ liferaft grossly depend on the weather conditions outside, e.g temperature, humidity and heat radiation by the sun Please note that the LSA code does take the weather into account Sea state Is referred to in regulations 13, 15 and 17 Regulations 13 and 15 state that life saving appliances should be protected from damage by heavy seas The term ‘heavy seas’ shall be defined in the rules in an objective manner, e.g defined by sea state The colour code red is used in Figure 3.1 to indicate that improvements are possible by defining ‘heavy seas’ Reg 17 refers to rescue boats It states that launching should be possible while the ship makes headway of maximum knots in calm water It implies that the man overboard case will mostly occur in calm seas For passenger ships there may be some rationale behind this implication, because in general the number of passengers on deck will decrease when the weather gets rough No scientific evidence exists for this statement In the same regulation recovery of the rescue boat is mentioned In case of moderate seas, this recovery should not take more than minutes Moreover recovery should be possible in ‘foul’ weather, in which case strops are to be used thus avoiding handling heavy blocks No specification exists for the expression ‘foul’ weather The expression ‘foul weather’ may refer to sea state, temperature, wind force, visibility and precipitation In this respect, the rule should be made more explicit; therefore colour code red has been used in the table Ship characteristics There are six regulations that refer, mostly in an implicit fashion, to ship characteristics Reg 12 states that launching stations should be located away from propellers, in order to ensure safe launching The station should be in an area where the shipside is (vertically) straight, i.e no overhang Finally the station should be behind the collision bulkhead The regulation does not apply for free fall lifeboats The rationale seems obvious; propellers may still be rotating during the launch and therefore may cause damage and injury The boats will topple or get stuck when the side along which they slide is curved, especially at substantial angles of heel Launching stations forward of the collision bulkhead may be damaged after a collision (green) Reg 13 specifies where survival craft should be stowed The same reasons as valid for the location of the launching stations are valid Moreover some requirements are specified related to the vertical position of survival craft The rationale behind the requirement with respect to the vertical position of the boat in the embarkation position is prevention of lifting the craft by any waves Therefore the embarkation level should be at least m above the waterline, even in case of serious heel (200 ) or trim (100 ) The ships beam in conjunction with the 200 list requirement clearly determines the embarkation height of the boat (green) Reg 14 states that a rescue boat should be stowed in a suitable position Suitable may refer to short distance between the (dis-)embarkation station and first aid location It may also refer to easy access for crewmembers from their normal working spaces or TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 35 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations sufficient deck space to handle a stretcher It is left to the reader’s discretion to interpret suitable position It may be worthwhile to consider specifying the aforementioned aspects Therefore colour code yellow is used Reg 15 specifies requirements for marine evacuation systems (chute, slide etc.) Since MES systems tend to be vulnerable when deployed, it seems obvious that their location be such that the ship structure cannot damage the system No improvement of the rule is required Reg 16 specifies that the survival craft launching should not be hampered by stabilisers, which should therefore be retractable using the emergency power supply The rationale is obvious Launching the craft on top of a stabiliser will cause damage When the craft is afloat it may even get stuck below the stabiliser There is a risk that the stabiliser of a damaged ship cannot be retracted This implies that a craft cannot be launched An easy way to circumvent this issue is to state in the regulation that it is not allowed to position craft above a stabiliser wing In Figure 3.1 the colour code yellow is suggested because an additional requirement must be met, i.e retract ability of the stabiliser Decay Reg 20 states requirements with respect to operational readiness, maintenance and inspections The regulation aims at continuous operability of the equipment It recognises that decay of material will occur Operators and regulators acknowledge that proper maintenance is the key to the successfulness of safe evacuation and that on the other hand proper maintenance is hard to ensure Some mechanisms, e.g on-load release hooks and remote control of winch brakes, are fairly complicated and sensitive to deterioration Therefore often qualified mechanics are required for proper maintenance, which are not available at all ports It could be argued that the systems need to be redesigned to reduce their complexity and vulnerability with respect to decay Reg 36 clearly states what to with respect to on- board maintenance It recognises that decay of equipment and material exists and must be prevented through maintenance In lieu of what has been said on reg 20, maintenance instructions tend to be too complicated for practical use onboard It should be noted that work pressure on the crew is generally high and that therefore systems, which are not, used daily may not receive sufficient attention 3.3 Human aspects Force/power Reg 10 specifies the number of persons required to operate launching systems and survival crafts It covers the fact that various actions need to be done simultaneously which cannot be handled by one person It does not in general state any requirement with respect to physical abilities It seems opportune to specify maximum required physical force to operate the systems Therefore the colour code red is suggested Reg 11 states that the distance between ships accommodation and survival embarkation stations should not be too large Some requirements are given for embarkation ladders The regulation is not specific The intention is that all crewmembers can reach the embarkation area with relative ease An additional requirement is given with respect to stretcher handling No actual maximum required physical forces etc are specified The colour code yellow is suggested Reg 13 states that LSA’s should be stowed in such a fashion that only two crewmembers are required to prepare the craft for launching within minutes This TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 36 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations implicitly specifies the maximum forces required to such a preparation It may be opportune to specify those forces explicitly (yellow) Reg 17 states that boarding and launching should be the shortest possible Also recovery time is mentioned and even specified (5 min) The regulation implies a balance between physical abilities of the crew and ease of handling the equipment It is not specified what the physical abilities of the crew should be, nor what ease of handling means E.g the crew shall be physically able to catch a heavy pulley block and hook in the lifeboat Especially with respect to recovery, problems are encountered in practice As a consequence, crews not feel encouraged to conduct LSA launching drills (red) Reg 19 is on training and drills It aims at creating competence with the crew to embark and operate Implicitly physical abilities are assumed It is not possible to make them explicit Sensory perception Reg 11 states requirements for illumination of embarkation stations This is clearly intended to be able to see where one goes and what happens during launching Reg 16 clearly states that the operator of the launching equipment should be able to observe, i.e have a clear view, at the survival craft It is also stated that the launching device and the area where the craft hits the water should be illuminated Again one can see what one is doing Reg 19 mentions emergency lighting for mustering and abandonment to be tested at each drill It is easy to understand that proper illumination is beneficial for safe embarkation of LSA’s as well as safe operation Moreover regular checks of such illumination are easy Therefore colour code green is suggested Intellectual Reg clearly states that operating instructions be available for all crafts and equipment A certain level of standardisation is required Also some level of simplicity is required The obvious purpose is to make sure that understanding the use of LSA equipment does not require an academic education Assessing the effectiveness of instructions based on symbols is not in anyway addressed (yellow) Reg 10 specifies what manning should be available to operate LSA’s Level of required education is, be it in unspecific terms, stated The aim is clearly to ensure that the equipment and crafts are dealt with by competent persons Non-certified persons may be assigned as liferaft operators when it is shown that they are sufficiently practiced How to assess ‘sufficiently practiced’ is not specified Therefore colour code yellow is suggested Reg 19 is quite explicit Emergency trainings and drills are specified explicitly They are clearly intended to ensure that crew is familiar with the equipment and crafts It aims at a level of familiarization where reading instructions etc will not be necessary in case of a real emergency Difficulties in understanding instructions etc can be solved during training hours In lieu of the workload on the crew it seems more than likely that time to familiarise is insufficient Moreover sometimes the crew considers the LSA’s dangerous to deploy The relative short periods that crew serves on one particular ship hampers familiarization with the LSA’s because they are not necessarily similar on different ships Therefore the colour code red is suggested Reg 35 states that there should be a training manual onboard Simplicity of the manual is mentioned but not specified Easy to understand instruction clearly contribute to a successful use of LSA’s TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 37 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Reg 36 specifies that a checklist should be available onboard, which must be used while maintaining the LSA equipment Moreover it states that written instruction be available related to al maintenance work to be done Obviously when used and read this kind of documentation can be very useful and definitely improve the condition of the equipment No requirement is stated with respect to the quality and simplicity of the documentation Reg 37 regulates the organization and documentation related to a ship abandon action It states that things should be organised, personnel assigned and documentation available It also says which issues should be dealt with It does not specify the documentation The transparency of the organisation and practicality of the documentation is not mentioned The rational behind this requirement is simply that a well organised and documented emergency crew will be more successful For regulations 35, 36 and 37 the implicit assumption is made that the LSA operators and onboard maintenance personal have a proper command of the (English?) language so they can read and interpret the given instructions This is probably not always the case (yellow) Physical Reg 31 states that, in case of survival craft on tankers, gas carriers and chemical tankers, survival craft should have their own air support system This clearly refers to physical exposure of the evacuees (green) Psychological No direct reference is made to psychological aspect of life saving through evacuation However some regulations exists which are related implicitly to psychological aspects Reg 19 quite extensively specifies training and drills It seems reasonable to assume that the psychological performance of well trained crew in case of an abandon ship emergency, will be superior to untrained people Large differences are expected between crews of various ships Enforcing that the trainings and drills are actually done is cumbersome Moreover training is often done in dedicated training centres, featuring equipment, which may not be quite similar to the equipment onboard Therefore colour code red is suggested Reg 37 specifies which instructions should be given and what documentation should be available for coping with an emergency situation It basically specifies how to prepare for an evacuation Proper communication between crewmembers seems crucial for a successful evacuation Especially with many nationalities on one ship this requirement may be difficult to meet No reference is made to this aspect (yellow) 3.4 Mechanical aspects Global mechanics Reg 13 states where launching equipment should be located The actual requirements show that the regulation is based on a clear knowledge of the mechanisms governing the launching process Also the mechanism associated with ‘launching’ when the ship sinks, i.e float-free, is included (green) Reg 14 also shows global mechanisms are recognised with respect to launching rescue boats A maximum allowable launching time of minutes is mentioned The rationale behind this figure is unclear (yellow) Reg 17 suggests that the impracticalities of recovering a rescue boat while in a sea state are well understood It gives an idea how to handle the recovery in such a case, by TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 38 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations suggesting recovery strops In general the recovery operation, in a sea state, is considered awkward The acceptability of putting crew at risks associated with this operation should be considered, perhaps more suitable systems can be designed, probably at a higher price (red) Local mechanics Reg 20 is quite explicit with respect to maintenance and inspection Launching appliances and release gear are mentioned The regulations clearly recognise the vulnerability of the local mechanisms, used in LSA’s Reg 36, similar to reg 20, recognises the vulnerability of equipment, including local mechanisms such as release hooks and remotely controlled breaks It is remarkable that no reference is made to the quality of the design and the manufacturing of the devices with respect to corrosion and wear It is worthwhile considering devices, which are practically maintenance free (red) TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 39 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Discussion and conclusions Many clever systems for ship evacuation could be identified and are described in this report Some systems seem rather complicated and vulnerable Especially the remote control on the winch brake, which depends on careful tuning, is identified as very vulnerable Retrieval of survival boats is considered cumbersome, which discourages crew to exercise Interpreting the regulations is hampered by a lack of clearly stated calamities Only in an implicit fashion hazard scenarios can be recognised, e.g list and trim refer to flooding Only in the recommendations for proto-type testing a reference could be found to a well specified sea state The capability of the abandoned ship to maintain course and speed is not referenced; explicit assumptions are evident with respect to maximum angle of list and trim Current regulations are very explicit with respect to maintenance, onboard training and emergency drill The effectiveness of these regulations heavily depends on the enforcement regime It is noted that only Chapter III of the SOLAS 2001 book has been considered A quick glance at the specifications in the LSA code and the section on Testing and Evaluation of Life-Saving Appliances shows that practically all aspects and characterisations are dealt with in those texts It seems opportune to carry out the analysis as reported in Chapter on the LSA Code and the Testing and Evaluation code From the results of the analysis on Chapter III of SOLAS 2001, it has become clear that most aspects and characterizations are being dealt with Sometimes the regulations are prescriptive by their nature However in many cases functional requirements are specified, while the designer, builder and operator are free to decide how the achieve the functional requirements In this sense much of the regulations already tend to be goal based by their nature TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 40 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations References 10 11 12 13 14 15 Norsafe website: www.norsafe.no Ned-deck Marine bv: www.neddeckmarine.com Fassmer website: www.fassmer.de Verhoef Aluminium Scheepsbouwindustrie BV: www.verhoef -alu.nl Survivalcraft website: www.survivalcraft.com Davit international: www.davit-international.de Viking: www.viking-life.com Zodiac: www.zodiacsolas.com Operation and maintenance manual camsafe SWL 7T Lifeboat release hook, Norsafe AS, downloaded from Norsafe website Ernst Hatecke: www.hatecke.de Jaarbericht 2003, Inspectie Verkeer en Waterstaat Discussion with Scheepvaart Inspectie, d.d August 23, September 7, 2004 Discussion with Global Safety group, d.d August 25, 2004 SOLAS consolidated edition 2001, IMO, ISBN 9280151002, London 2001 Life-Saving Appliances, 2003 Edition, ISBN 9280151436 TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 41 / 42 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Acknowledgement In gathering information about Life Saving Appliances, discussions with Klaas Gorter, Henk de Rooy and Jan Paul Schuiten [12] from the Dutch shipping inspectorate and Niilo Alakopsa [13] from the Global Safety Group were very helpful The authors wish to acknowledge their efforts TNO report 2005-CMC-R006 An Overview of Life Saving Appliances and Rationale of Regulations Approval Author: Ir M.J Wolf Approved: Ir A.W Vredeveldt Visa: Dr.ir A.C Steenbrink 42 / 42