Marine accidents: quality vs. safety and one step further

International Journal of Ocean Systems Management

Volumn 1, Issue 1, 2008, Pages 45-67

  Goulielmos, Alexandros M ^a   Mitroussi, Kyriaki ^b   Gatzoli, Androniki ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF PIRAEUS   (Greece)

^b CARDIFF UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

chaos and complexity; management; marine accidents; marine captain; safety culture; shipping; Total Quality Management; total safety management; TQM

Indexed keywords

EID: 84858986802     PISSN: 17526582     EISSN: 17526590     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1504/IJOSM.2008.017781     Document Type: Article

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57. The US Coast Guard defines a marine accident as any casualty or accident involving a vessel (Strauch, 2002, 2004).
58. Also in ABS, and other improvements in case of a collision and in relation to wheels, steering etc.
59. The international management code for the safe operation of ships and for pollution prevention as adopted by the Assembly (and as may be amended) by the Organisation (International Maritime-IMO) as Chapter IX of SOLAS convention 1974 in force since 1 July, 1998 for certain types and sizes of ships. It has been amended on 1 July, 2002.
60. Chapter XI-2 of Solas in force since 1 July, 2004 called: “International ship and port facility security code”.
61. Oil companies’ international marine forum.
62. Society of International Gas Tanker and Terminal Operators Ltd.
63. ISPS code is a product of the events that took place in USA on 11 September, 2001.
64. An action or decision that results in one or more unintended negative outcomes (p.21) (Strauch, 2002, 2004).
65. Deals with protection of crew members that report.
66. This is called an observed situation where objective evidence indicates the non-fulfilment of a specified requirement.
67. In the ISM Code, a major non-conformity is an identifiable deviation that poses a serious threat to the safety of personnel or the ship or a serious risk to the environment that requires immediate corrective action and includes the lack of effective and systematic implementation of a requirement. These have to be well pre-specified to make sense.
68. A safety culture is an informed culture (Reason, 1997; Weick and Sutcliffe, 2001) where those who manage and operate the system have current knowledge about the human, technical, organisational and environmental factors that determine the safety of the system as a whole.
69. A Designated Person Ashore is an office–officer liaison between ship and office and responsible for safety.
70. Complaints must be perceived as positive feedback, where an improvement will follow. In the ISM Code, non-conformities and major non-conformities are negative feedback. Also according to Port State Control, we create a system of error–punishment philosophy. This philosophy does not build the so-called ‘reporting culture’ mentioned here.
71. Culture change is admittedly hard, slow and subject to frequent relapses and according to Schein (1999) is used when a specific problem is to be solved. Only when a work can be done with existing cultural strengths (Weick and Sutcliffe, 2001, p.125), culture change is not allowed to be exerted. We disagree with applying the same idea to ship’s safety culture change, as safety culture change in shipping has an element of urgency and where enough time in ships is not available. See also Goulielmos (2004, 2005).
72. One of the pioneers who stands out in the field of total quality.
73. In the case of the accident of M/V RoRo ‘Scandinavian Star’ (1990), most passengers died as a result of suffocation from the gases released from the burning of the fire-resistant doors made from a new chemical substance probably not tested before!
74. Indeed, this is a requirement of the ISM Code and characteristically enough frequently constitutes an observation made by external auditors (PSC).
75. A reporting culture is about protection of people who report and what kind of report is trusted.
76. Here, a safety culture must be developed against medical errors so that the processes and workforce have to be focused on improving the reliability and safety of care for patients.
77. Which of course always has been there and even before the ISM Code.
78. The forum believes that best practice is the most effective way to solve problems. It creates opportunities and it optimises the performance in the critical areas of safety and the absolute protection of the environment.
79. See www.ocimf-tmsa.com (with a fee).
80. Given that Oil Companies take care when they select ships for charter so that these ships need to be well maintained and well managed.
81. This is more than checking off boxes by the First Mate.
82. To achieve: a clear corporate mission, promote common values, foster and embed a strong safety culture to give a clear sense of direction to employees, establish guiding principles, recognise and reward safety efforts have active managerial participation in carrying out accident prevention programmes. They should lead the way to the accomplishment of company’s goals, they should lead by example.
83. From a company’s Safety Manual.
84. Exists in a vessel, if the Captain has current knowledge about human, technical, organisational and environmental factors, which determine the safety of the ship.
85. Knowledge based on personal experience is questioned if this is the most trusted source of knowledge. Also, the next most trusted source of knowledge is oral communication.
86. Violation of informed culture took place during the explosion on 7 August 1994, which killed 11 miners in Australia (Moura underground coal mine) (Weick and Sutcliffe, 2001, p.128).
87. And it was here that ISM Code was successful, i.e., to deal with human error, a field ignored for 250 years.
88. Prepared also to resort to a guide to self-assessment like OCIMF.
89. One must condemn the statement of Ivar Manum, Managing director of the Norwegian Maritime Directorate, in case of high-speed ferry ‘Sleipner’ with a loss of 16 lives: “accidents must occur for safety at sea to improve”…
90. Taken from University of Michigan Business School Management series (Weick and Sutcliffe, 2001, p.128).