Muster Stations...Why Outside??

[broberts]

This all sounds good in theory, but is very unlikely to play out in the reality of an actual abandon ship emergency. I understand your onboard experience, but how many times have you actually reacted in that type of true emergency? Each of us may try to follow the preconceived instructions in an actual abandon ship emergency, but what actually happens in that situation will likely be much different. A similar scenario plays out on airplanes more frequently than it does on passenger ships, and the result is passengers take control of the situation to the benefit of all passengers and crew. And the reason for that is that passengers greatly outnumber crew members, and for the most part, the reality of human nature takes control of the situation to the benefit of all people involved. Let's face reality, most human beings are basically good people and will step up to the plate when circumstances call for it. They'll do the right thing to help others in need. Also remember, most ship emergencies do not involve the same type of threats that occur on land.

 

No doubt an actual situation will progress in less that optimal fashion. However, that assertion that in aircraft evacuations passengers take control is simply not accurate. Cabin crew are highly trained in aircraft evacuation procedures. I cannot recall a single incident in which passengers overrode cabin crew. In fact in all the instances I can recall, passengers were effusive in their praise of the crew and their management of the evacuation.

 

Crew on aircraft and cruise ships are knowledgeable and practiced in evacuating their craft. Passengers have no such expertise and when they attempt to take over they more often than not simply add to the confusion.

 

The thought that passengers having little familiarity with the craft, little knowledge of the equipment, and no understanding of the overall plan taking over an evacuation fills me with dread. Although the only recent cruise ship example, Costa Concordia, suggests that this is sometimes necessary.

[chengkp75]

This all sounds good in theory, but is very unlikely to play out in the reality of an actual abandon ship emergency. I understand your onboard experience, but how many times have you actually reacted in that type of true emergency? Each of us may try to follow the preconceived instructions in an actual abandon ship emergency, but what actually happens in that situation will likely be much different. A similar scenario plays out on airplanes more frequently than it does on passenger ships, and the result is passengers take control of the situation to the benefit of all passengers and crew. And the reason for that is that passengers greatly outnumber crew members, and for the most part, the reality of human nature takes control of the situation to the benefit of all people involved. Let's face reality, most human beings are basically good people and will step up to the plate when circumstances call for it. They'll do the right thing to help others in need. Also remember, most ship emergencies do not involve the same type of threats that occur on land.

 

No doubt an actual situation will progress in less that optimal fashion. However, that assertion that in aircraft evacuations passengers take control is simply not accurate. Cabin crew are highly trained in aircraft evacuation procedures. I cannot recall a single incident in which passengers overrode cabin crew. In fact in all the instances I can recall, passengers were effusive in their praise of the crew and their management of the evacuation.

 

Crew on aircraft and cruise ships are knowledgeable and practiced in evacuating their craft. Passengers have no such expertise and when they attempt to take over they more often than not simply add to the confusion.

 

The thought that passengers having little familiarity with the craft, little knowledge of the equipment, and no understanding of the overall plan taking over an evacuation fills me with dread. Although the only recent cruise ship example, Costa Concordia, suggests that this is sometimes necessary.

 

I have actually been involved in more shipboard emergencies than I care to think about (fires, flooding, loss of power). Even with all the training in the world, until the real thing happens, you never know how you will react, but training and drills help to make "muscle memory" kick in without thought.

 

As for the "most people are basically good people and will step up to the plate when circumstances call for it", senior officers on ships are trained in "crowd and crisis management" (and tasked with passing this training on to the crew), and there are three types of people: leaders, followers, and panickers, and the "leaders" who will take charge are few and far between, and you are trained to look for these people to use as "force multipliers" to handle the vast majority who fall into the "followers" category, while the trained crew deal with the few panic cases. This is based on study of all kinds of emergency situations, and the reactions of the people involved by professionals in the study of human behavior.

 

And as I always say when the topic of musters and emergencies brings up the Concordia, the sole reason for loss of life on the Concordia was the fact that the passenger muster was not called in a timely fashion. Had the passengers been called to their muster stations soon after the collision, when Schettino was informed of the flooding in the engine room, as it should have been, the passengers would all have been sorted out and accounted for, the organization and structure of the crew's emergency duties would have been a calming influence, the crew would have been at their emergency stations, things like lifejackets would have had time to be distributed (negating people returning to their cabins for them, or returning to their cabins based on directions from the bridge), the boats would have been prepared, and the eventual evacuation would have gone smoothly.

 

This, as I've often stated, is what the passenger muster is all about. It isn't about the lifeboats, or even the possibility of getting into the lifeboats. It is all about accountability. If we can have all of the untrained passengers, who are our charges, accounted for and in controlled locations, it allows the emergency crews to focus on the emergency, not trying to find missing people. The number of times passengers have been sent to their muster stations in actual emergencies is far greater than the number of times they have gotten in the boats, or even had the Captain considered evacuation.

[jerseyjjs]

I have actually been involved in more shipboard emergencies than I care to think about (fires, flooding, loss of power). Even with all the training in the world, until the real thing happens, you never know how you will react, but training and drills help to make "muscle memory" kick in without thought.

 

As for the "most people are basically good people and will step up to the plate when circumstances call for it", senior officers on ships are trained in "crowd and crisis management" (and tasked with passing this training on to the crew), and there are three types of people: leaders, followers, and panickers, and the "leaders" who will take charge are few and far between, and you are trained to look for these people to use as "force multipliers" to handle the vast majority who fall into the "followers" category, while the trained crew deal with the few panic cases. This is based on study of all kinds of emergency situations, and the reactions of the people involved by professionals in the study of human behavior.

 

And as I always say when the topic of musters and emergencies brings up the Concordia, the sole reason for loss of life on the Concordia was the fact that the passenger muster was not called in a timely fashion. Had the passengers been called to their muster stations soon after the collision, when Schettino was informed of the flooding in the engine room, as it should have been, the passengers would all have been sorted out and accounted for, the organization and structure of the crew's emergency duties would have been a calming influence, the crew would have been at their emergency stations, things like lifejackets would have had time to be distributed (negating people returning to their cabins for them, or returning to their cabins based on directions from the bridge), the boats would have been prepared, and the eventual evacuation would have gone smoothly.

 

This, as I've often stated, is what the passenger muster is all about. It isn't about the lifeboats, or even the possibility of getting into the lifeboats. It is all about accountability. If we can have all of the untrained passengers, who are our charges, accounted for and in controlled locations, it allows the emergency crews to focus on the emergency, not trying to find missing people. The number of times passengers have been sent to their muster stations in actual emergencies is far greater than the number of times they have gotten in the boats, or even had the Captain considered evacuation.

 

 

 

 

In the particular case of the Concordia, the entire starboard side of the muster stations were rendered useless as those lifeboats were submerged and/or crushed by the capsizing vessel within a 1/2 hour.

[chengkp75]

In the particular case of the Concordia, the entire starboard side of the muster stations were rendered useless as those lifeboats were submerged and/or crushed by the capsizing vessel within a 1/2 hour.

 

Actually, 23 of 26 lifeboats were successfully launched, so the "entire starboard side of the muster station" was not rendered useless, as 10 of the 13 boats on that side were launched.

 

The ship did not capsize within a 1/2 hour. The ship struck the rock at 2145 hours, yet the first announcement to the passengers to go to their muster stations is not made until 2236 hours, nearly an hour later, and the order to "abandon ship" is made at 2254 hours, only 18 minutes later. This is totally the reverse of how this should have happened, the muster signal should have been given within minutes of the grounding, and then the abandon ship after an hour, so that things were properly prepared, and the situation evaluated. The ship never experiences listing of over 20* (the limit for safely launching boats and rafts) until the ship grounds again off Giglio harbor at around 2300 hours (and this second grounding is what caused the ship to capsize rather than sink on an even keel, since the portion of the ship resting on the bottom caused the mass of water in the engine room to flow to the starboard side causing the capsize). Even then, boats were being launched at heel angles of 25-30*. Schettino was informed shortly after the initial contact that three or more compartments of the engine room were flooding, and he is heard on recordings acknowledging that if only two compartments were flooding, "we are okay", but if it was in fact 3 compartments, then there was no action anyone could take, and no force on God's earth that was going to keep that ship afloat, so he should have mustered the passengers much, much earlier, and ordered the evacuation (not abandon ship, since during a passenger evacuation the crew remains onboard until the passengers are away), much earlier.

[skidawg79]

All 3 Dream Class ships ,Dream ,Magic and Breeze are all done inside

 

Is this new? last May on the Magic, it was outside. Would love if they were changing it to inside. RCI and Princess both did theirs inside, was awesome. Anyone know about the Splendor?

[ontheweb]

 

And as I always say when the topic of musters and emergencies brings up the Concordia, the sole reason for loss of life on the Concordia was the fact that the passenger muster was not called in a timely fashion. Had the passengers been called to their muster stations soon after the collision, when Schettino was informed of the flooding in the engine room, as it should have been, the passengers would all have been sorted out and accounted for, the organization and structure of the crew's emergency duties would have been a calming influence, the crew would have been at their emergency stations, things like lifejackets would have had time to be distributed (negating people returning to their cabins for them, or returning to their cabins based on directions from the bridge), the boats would have been prepared, and the eventual evacuation would have gone smoothly.

 

This, as I've often stated, is what the passenger muster is all about. It isn't about the lifeboats, or even the possibility of getting into the lifeboats. It is all about accountability. If we can have all of the untrained passengers, who are our charges, accounted for and in controlled locations, it allows the emergency crews to focus on the emergency, not trying to find missing people. The number of times passengers have been sent to their muster stations in actual emergencies is far greater than the number of times they have gotten in the boats, or even had the Captain considered evacuation.

 

Would this alone be considered gross negligence on the part of the captain? Should whoever was second in command issued the order to muster when it was obvious the captain was not protecting the passengers, or would that be considered mutiny?

[chengkp75]

Would this alone be considered gross negligence on the part of the captain? Should whoever was second in command issued the order to muster when it was obvious the captain was not protecting the passengers, or would that be considered mutiny?

 

I haven't read the court transcripts of Schettino's trial to know exactly what the specifications of the charges against him were, but in my opinion, yes, this was gross negligence (I refuse to grant him a title). And the Staff Captain and Hotel Director were convicted (plea deals) for their part in not following the emergency plans per the ISM (International Safety Management) plan as promulgated by the company to meet the requirements of the international ISM code.

[watermelonqueen99]

I would rather pull out every one of my toenails by hand than to endure Muster outside. That's why we prefer Dream class and up.

[ontheweb]

I haven't read the court transcripts of Schettino's trial to know exactly what the specifications of the charges against him were, but in my opinion, yes, this was gross negligence (I refuse to grant him a title). And the Staff Captain and Hotel Director were convicted (plea deals) for their part in not following the emergency plans per the ISM (International Safety Management) plan as promulgated by the company to meet the requirements of the international ISM code.

 

Thank you for your answer. I was not really looking for what the courts found, but for your opinion as to whether his delay in giving the order to muster was in and of itself negligent. I believe the court was more interested in his sailing too close to that island.

 

I also take from your answer that those immediately below him in the chain of command should have acted. Or at least that was the findings of the court.

[wolfatlga]

Greetings,

Does the Miracle muster inside?

I too have trouble standing that long.

Thanks,

Roy

[hockeyguru32]

Other lines do, no idea why carnival doesn't. Have cruises Norwegian and celebrity and never had to do a mister drill standing outside. We did one on the carnival glory and it was miserable; everyone had to stand in a line silently while they went through instructions. If anyone sat down or talked they stopped to tell people to stand back up

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

 

Norwegian Sky is done outside

[bar1068]

Norwegian Sky is done outside

 

Pride of America is also outside...

[ccruisequeen]

Greetings,

Does the Miracle muster inside?

I too have trouble standing that long.

Thanks,

Roy

in january The Disabled were Shuffled From The Martini bar And the lounge next to the Thester.