Grounded ‘Mega Ship’ Blocking Suez Canal in Both Directions

[Benz]

If the ship did a dance inside the canal, isn't the pilot responsible, at least partially? When a ship hit the Golden Gate Bridge fenders a while ago, the entire focus was on the pilot, not the ship's captain. I wonder how things will shake down here...

[Sand crab]

The pilot would probably be to blame but they are saying there was a complete power failure. Lots of big ships are diesel electric like locomotives. They have lots of separate massive generators that supply juice to the electric propulsion. No juice, no go.

[NaClyDog]

Originally Posted by Sand crab

The pilot would probably be to blame but they are saying there was a complete power failure. Lots of big ships are diesel electric like locomotives. They have lots of separate massive generators that supply juice to the electric propulsion. No juice, no go.

I read about the complete power failure. I wonder how many systems had to completely die for this to occur. I would have thought that such a huge vessel would have redundancies built onto their redundancies.

[Sailmonkey]

Originally Posted by Sand crab

The pilot would probably be to blame but they are saying there was a complete power failure. Lots of big ships are diesel electric like locomotives. They have lots of separate massive generators that supply juice to the electric propulsion. No juice, no go.

This particular ship is powered by a single low speed engine that is direct couple to the shaft.

Here’s the same model before installation.



However a loss of electrical power can knock out all of the supporting equipment that keeps the big engine running.

[LittleWing77]

Now this story has reached international news status. Just heard it as part of the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corp) News this morning. Wow.

According to that report, 150 other commercial vessels are being prevented (and are waiting) to transit the Suez Canal...

Sheesh! They noted a number of tugs that are working to dislodge the fully loaded ship, but with a tidal range (I think somewhere it was reported as the range) of only 1.9 metres, who thinks they will need to lighten the ship (i.e somehow take off some of those containers...) before that monster is going to budge?

Fortunately, there is a full moon this weekend, so they might get lucky.

LittleWing77

[boatman61]

Well they have a couple more days till max HW to get her off and they are removing fuel to lighten her, only thing they can't do is remove the thousands of containers as there's now floating cranes large enough in the area.

[GordMay]

[LittleWing77]

Originally Posted by GordMay

OMG! That whole front bulb structure is bent to starboard!!!

[Sailmonkey]

Originally Posted by LittleWing77

OMG! That whole front bulb structure is bent to starboard!!!

Just a perspective trick, look at the line of the bottom paint for reference

[LittleWing77]

Originally Posted by Sailmonkey

Just a perspective trick, look at the line of the bottom paint for reference

Nope. Really have a look at it. It's bent.

[GordMay]

***

[Woodland Hills]

Was a Suez pilot in command at the time of the incident? This ship was in a convoy and it was the only vessel affected by the wind enough to hit the bank.

If there was no steering failure it was operator error.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Woodland Hills

Was a Suez pilot in command at the time of the incident? This ship was in a convoy and it was the only vessel affected by the wind enough to hit the bank.

If there was no steering failure it was operator error.

A Pilot was on board and it was doing 13kts, above the speed limit but this is discretional on the Egyptian pilot.
When the engine failed the strong wind caught the container stacks pushing the bow across as steerage way was lost..
No steerage way, no control.. no matter how good a helmsman you think you are.

[Woodland Hills]

I did not know there was a propulsion failure.

[MicHughV]

if I was that pilot, probably a good time to say "f**k, there goes my day job..."

interestingly, some many years ago, I was on a cruise ship that lost engine power, but they had generators that ran off their own diesel engines...so there was electrical power, but no motive power, that's a lot of windage there, and that cruise ship was not a happy camper without motive power....so I can certainly see a container ship quickly getting into trouble in a narrow channel....

so now, the law suits will start piling up......