chengkp75

From your lips to the IMO's ear. 🤞

The operative word is was. But because of his actions that night, he has had his license revoked, and because of those actions, I have no professional respect for him, and will not refer to him as a Captain in any reference from the time of the accident onwards.

No, if you read the report, you find that the investigators found that the crew in general, did very well, with the information and direction they were given. You will note that all of the "should haves" you quote are attributable to one person, the Captain. Crew cannot go willy nilly making decisions about sending passengers to muster, getting boats ready to launch, loading boats, etc. That is chaos. Like it or not, a ship is a hierarchical operation, and things have to come from the top down, but this didn't happen on the Concordia that night.

As I said, it was a violation, but MSC and the various commands that the cargo belonged to insisted that we could transport it. Some of the MSC operated ships are US built so they are coastwise compliant, but many are not, and they don't understand the difference.

Andy would know better than I, but I don't see anything in these links that suggests that the foreign seafarers are allowed in cabotage trade. I know that US flag ships are not necessarily compliant for Jones Act/PVSA trade, as many of even the US government owned and operated US flag ships are not Jones Act compliant. I served on one foreign built, US flag ship that was under charter to Military Sealift Command, and that was constantly being asked to carry military cargo from one US port to another, and we had to repeatedly deny this use, as we had been fined once for doing so. I believe there are Canadian flag vessels, as well, that are not coastwise compliant.

Just shy of $4 million to eliminate a competitor, about what I expected. Wonder if the Empress will follow.

I'm not sure what union represents the unlicensed crew on the Staten Island ferry, but the licensed officers are represented by MEBA, one of two maritime officer unions. I would be surprised if the unlicense crew are not represented by the SIU (Seafarers International Union, as these two unions typically require the company to contract with both unions), but you can be an employee of a company (or city) and a member of a different union than other government employees (like government employees union and teachers union). But, this is far afield from the OP's question.

Yes, but it is possible for someone in a supervisory position, especially on a ship, to have never faced a true at sea emergency. Many mariners go their entire career without an emergency, just as many law enforcement officers go their entire career without drawing their firearm. Is it the norm? No, but not unheard of either.

All licensed officers have to be US citizens. Unlicensed crew have to be 75% citizens, and 25% green card (resident alien, so taxpaying) holders. Only NCL has an exemption to allow NRAC (non-resident alien crew) to serve on US flag ships, and those have to be part of the 25% of unlicensed crew. The NRAC's have to be paid US wages, pay US Social Security tax, US income tax, and have other requirements, like having worked for NCL for 10 years prior, and NCL obtaining a work visa for them.

And, none of the ship's crews on the Staten Island ferry are government employees. They are members of the maritime unions. And, yes, the Staten Island ferry is free, so that can be an outlier. How many government run entities have been privatized in the last couple of decades?

I've known firefighters and EMT's that fold up at the first actual emergency, but let's face it, their careers are typically very short then. I don't recall whether or not Schettino was found to be drinking, but I don't believe he was breathalyzed. Merely incredibly poor judgement, but then again, the actual allision would not have proved fatal (to the ship, yes, to the passengers and crew, no) had he acted accordingly afterwards. Even his claims of "steering" the ship back to ground on Giglio are false. You don't "steer" a ship with no propulsion, let alone power. And the forensic engineering shows that had the ship not drifted back to Giglio and grounded, it would have taken significantly longer to sink, and would have done so upright, if down by the stern. What caused the ship to roll over was the second grounding at Giglio, where, as the ship continued to fill with water, the port side was grounded and could not sink any further, so the water filled the starboard side, causing the ship to roll over. You'll note that Concordia was laying on her starboard side, while the tear in the hull was on the port side, and eventually up in the air, above water level.

And, how have the maritime unions done with maintaining a US flag foreign-going fleet? Why are the vast majority of USNS ships (Marad owned and operated for logistical support of the DOD) foreign built? Maritime labor has very little clout in the US. And the bad optics would be offset by the optics of saying "we cut the cost to operate these ferries by 75%, there will be fare decreases or no fare increases for the foreseeable future" And, if the competitors, like Circle Line, and all the water taxis in NYC were to go foreign flag, and then offer services competing with the Staten Island ferry, demand would drop, revenue would drop, subsidy would increase, and the politicians would say "let's privatize it", and let it go..

No idea. Lots of the muslim crew would not want to partake. The tips are usually very good on these cruises, so I don't think there would be a shortage.

While you may be right about government agencies not going to foreign flag (though what would be the incentive to incur far higher operating costs by retaining US flag?), there are 190 private ferry operators in the US that would be likely to avail themselves of foreign flag. Wouldn't any government agency avail itself of cost reductions if they were legal? Who even looks to see what flag the Staten Island ferry is flying, or the port of registry? Alaska Marine Highway (I misidentified), is having huge problems keeping vessels operating, and crewing them, and are cutting back on services, some of which are essential to rural areas in Alaska. What would be the holdback to foreign flagging these vessels if the PVSA was no longer in force?

One of the most damning things I've found about the Concordia, were recordings from Schettino's girlfriend's phone, and the bridge voice recorder. On them, Schettino is informed by the senior engineer on scene that there are three engine room compartments flooding (there were actually 4). Schettino then says, "are you sure it's three compartments", and comments that if it were only two, the ship could stay afloat, but if it were three, the ship would definitely sink. All modern cruise ships are "two compartment" ships, meaning that two adjacent watertight compartments can completely flood, and the ship will remain afloat, but that if more than two flood, there is nothing that can be done to keep the ship afloat. So, Schettino acknowledges that he knows this, and is informed repeatedly that it is three compartments, and he does nothing. Had he signaled for passenger muster at that time (within minutes of striking the rock), passengers would have been accounted for, and standing by the boats, and they could have all been launched while the ship was upright, as she did not start to list beyond the ability of the lifeboats to launch (15* list) for at least an hour after the allision.