Many of you may recall last year in October when the 'RoRo' container ship the El Faro sank roughly 36 miles off the coast of the Bahamas.
28 officers and crew along with 5 Polish contract workers all perished after the ship was caught in the eye of Hurricane Joaquin en route to Jacksonville, Florida.
Joaquin was a CAT4 storm with sustained 120 knot winds and 160 knot gusts, delivering swells ranging from 30 to 40 feet high.
The El Faro was a 'roll on, roll off' vessel designed to transport vehicles, and other cargo that is too large for standard containers.
The ship abruptly sank after a series of waves crashed against the port side, knocking open a cargo hold door which subsequently flooded and caused the ship to list at 15 degrees, and caused the main propulsion diesel engine to fail, leaving the El Faro completely helpless at the worst possible time.
On August 8th, the 'black box' recording was recovered from the ocean floor, and over 14 hours of communication between the captain, mates, coast guard, and several crew members were transcribed into a PDF file and made public last week.
I read the document last night, and can say that it was positively chilling. Its apparent that the majority of the crew was likely in their cabins, and all the engineers were still in the engine room desperately trying to shift water to the starboard side ballast tanks to correct the list, and restore power.
The El Faro sank in less than 3 minutes, and the black box transcript abruptly ends with the captain and one of the able bodied seaman desperately trying to climb to an exit point before being pulled under.
Its likely that the rest of the crew was unaware the ship had gone down until they were hundreds of feet under the ocean. The prevailing theory is that many of them could have survived for days at the bottom of the ocean floor if they managed to seal watertight compartments, but obviously the supply of oxygen would have been quickly depleted.
The El Faro is a tragic incident which reminded all merchant mariners just how dangerous our profession is, and why safety is paramount in day to day operations.
If you Google 'El Faro Black Box PDF' you can download the entire transcript, which is compelling reading to say the least.
RIP to the crew
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Originally Posted by LarryLaffer
