Stamford, Connecticut, USA: The accident frequency in shipping has decreased over the past few decades. However, although the figures today are half of what they were in the late 80s, this trend is about to turn.
DNV monitors the annual frequency of serious accidents in several ship segments. Over the last five years, figures from this monitoring show an increasing incidence of serious accidents in several shipping segments. Even the tanker segment, with its high focus on safety, has more reported accidents today than it did five years ago.
Dr Espen Cramer, the head of DNV Maritime Solutions, says: “It is well known that ships and shipping companies are today inspected and audited with increasing intensity. Both the technical standard and transparency are better today than it was years back. In spite of this, we are seeing that the numbers are going in the wrong direction.”
DNV’s worry is that there is more stress and fatigue relating to the people and organisations both onboard and onshore. The shipping industry is booming these days. There is huge growth in almost every segment and the net annual growth in demand for crew is enormous. At the same time, the shipping industry has to fight against loss of manpower to other industries and a short supply of quality crew from international training providers.
Espen Cramer adds: “In sum, the general level of experience on board vessels has been reduced. There are more new recruits, less retention and faster promotion. In addition to these trends, the workload on board with respect to paperwork and inspections has increased while the crew size is stable. The loss of experience is also a stress factor for those on board who continuously have to train new crewmembers.”
The DNV statistics show that an area of high concern is navigational accidents such as collisions, stranding and contact damage.
To reverse this trend and reduce accidents, Espen Cramer wants more focus on the crew on board and the management onshore:
“The crew has to be more involved in safety programmes and the management has to demonstrate more commitment to safety. In that respect, shipping still has more to learn from other industries such as offshore and aviation, where there has been an intense focus on human and organisational factors for more than 25 years.”