Q:-State the requirement and responsibility of the office in enforcing “emergency preparedness” procedures for a ship and its personnel, as required under ISM Codes? Describe the duties of the office in: (i) Formation of the emergency team (ii) During emergency situations (iii) Maintaining contact between ship and office.
ANSWER :-
i. “ Emergency Preparedness” as stated under Clause 8 of ISM code is to make sure that the company has an integrated system with ship and shore during an emergency.
ii. The office should be prepared at all times to efficiently handle an emergency situation which might occur on any of the company’s vessels.
iii. Clause 8.3 also states that the Safety management system should provide for measures ensuring that a company’s organisation can respond at any times to hazards accidents and emergency situations.
iv. This will be achieved by developing and maintaining contingency, emergency and marine pollution prevention plans and by training and drills of the personnel involved both on board and also when a vessel is in, or reports an emergency situation.
v. The contingency team shall as soon as possible, assist the master to initiate, engage, command and co-ordinate the appropriate action as the situation may require in order to primarily, mitigate injuries or damage to:-
- The people
- The environment
- The cargo
- The vessel
- Leader of contingency team
- Technical
- Operation
- Manning
- Insurance
- Legal
- Administration
- Designated Person Ashore
- Safety Officer
- Security Officer
viii. The company has to lay down a policy in which the contingency team shall be ready at any time. This must be assembled within 2hr notice. Vacations must be planned in accordance with the requirement & persons with operational knowledge should be available at all times.
ix. Also the contingency team shall be tested & drilled twice a year; provided the team has not been actually mobilised during that period. The drill plan shall be as realistic as possible; starting with a drill message released from one of the vessels and followed up by messages of the accident development.
x. The exercise plan of the company audit system shall be worked out.The actions of the contingency team shall be monitored and written records maintained. When the drill is finished, a briefing shall take place.
The company has the duties as per the policy during every instance such as :-
1. Formation of Emergency Team :-
The company has to form a contingency or emergency team which has the level and leadership, also have the planned and well known duties of each person. The Emergency team consists of members which have the duties in them.
The situation is divided in two levels; Red Level Mobilisation & Green Level Mobilisation.
The Red Mobilisation is incidents of catastrophic nature such as explosions, major fire, collision, grounding, major oil or NLS spill and missing vessel.
The Green Mobilisations are serious breakdowns, loading/discharging problems, heavy weather problems, minor oil or NLS substance spill etc.
Where necessary assistance to the ship can be arranged by the ships technical superintendent or member of the relevant company department. Also the team consists of following persons:-
Level of Mobilisation Red Green
- Leader of the Emergency team X
- Maritime/Safety X
- Technical X X
- Operation X X
- Manning X
- Insurance X
- Legal X
- Administration X
The head of the technical and marine division will normally serve as leader of the team, & in his absence the leadership is passed down in the order of hierarchy. The actions taken are on behalf of the company as they deem necessary in an emergency situation.
The leader has power to contact Board of Management after a red mobilisation & keep managing director duly informed of the occurrence & development.
2 . During Emergency Situation :-
Whenever there is an emergency situation, the vessel calls the company & the one who gets the message first is responsible for contacting the head of the Technical & Marine division and they will agree on the level of Mobilisation & if the head is not available, the one who gets the message first shall use his own judgement decide the level of mobilisation, & he shall then inform the Emergency team members. Company should know the development of the situation and master may seek advice from the Emergency team & discuss further action to be taken · During action, each member of the team shall evaluate the condition under his responsibility.
The team leader shall be kept fully informed about any action suggested or executed by the member of the team.
Also during action the person –in-charge and his assistant is appointed for the following job:-
- Appoint the Emergency team
- Keep the Emergency room equipped and in good order
- Keep the relevant charts available
- Keep track of members
- Receive the alarm report / mobilise the team
- Call the Tech superintendent’s & fleet manager
- Notify the owner, charterer, cargo owner, Class and D.G.Shipping
- Hire of Salvage
- Inform the relatives
- Call press conference & inform the media
- Set up communication
- Logging & secretarial duties
The team has to go through the situation & evaluate a most probably and worst case development scenario, and during the situation analysis, priorities should be life-safety environment & property, when decisions are made.
The team evaluating the situation & making the action plan which are based on a worst case development scenario. The action plan shall be updated continuously as soon as new information is received. Also the team shall not diminish the masters’ over riding responsibility and discretion to take whatever action he considers to be in the best interest of the crew, vessel and environment. Also the team has to decide to have an assistance from the specialists who may be able to provide information, contribution to solve the actual problem. Also the information to media & relatives of the crew must be given when things are confirmed & only a spokesman should speak to media & fleet personnel to the relatives & both should be updated as the news gets confirmed
3. Maintaining Contact between Ship & Office :-
As described earlier, the contact between ship and office is to be maintained through out the action so that the advice is given to the master or person-in-charge on board, what is to be done, & what may be the further action. Also the company knows the latest developments & cam plan accordingly.
