Shipboard Factors: A Case Study

1 Introduction and theoretical framework

This thesis examines shipboard factors that may influence the crews’ ability to achieve and maintain situation awareness (SA) and safe behaviour on board offshore vessels. Shipboard factors refer to factors in the internal environment on board the vessel, such as work practises, on board leadership and job demands. SA is seen both as a cognitive process in the individual, but also as a distributed characteristic of a complex collaborative system, while safe behaviour refers to the willingness to take a risk. To set the agenda, a brief introduction is provided, along with the theoretical foundation for the thesis.

1.1 Background

In general, seafaring involves risk of grounding, capsizing and colliding

By means of several data sources (i.e. accident reports, observational data and survey data) and various methodology (i.e. documentary study, field studies and statistical analysis) the thesis illuminate the theme from multiple angles. The genesis for the thesis was an initial analysis of a selection accident reports concerning collisions between offshore vessels and offshore facilities. The analysis indicated that human error caused by loss of SA was an important contributing factor to the collisions. However, in order to understand the process that led to the collisions, it is necessary to see these findings in light of factors that have influenced the bridge crews’ ability to achieve and maintain SA. A reanalysis of the accident reports thus aimed at identifying factors that might have contributed to the loss of SA in the course of event (marked as ‘study 1’ in figure

As a consequence, the offshore facilities are surrounded by a 500-metre safety zone whereupon the vessels are not allowed to enter without permission from the offshore facility control room. Whenever the vessel is operating inside the safety zones, the bridge is normally manned with two officers. In this way there will be redundancy in the bridge organization, as the officers can provide support to each other. Even though redundancy in the bridge organization is supposed to increase safety, it is a prerequisite that the bridge officers have clarified their roles before they enter the safety zone – if not the system may be vulnerable to human error caused by misunderstandings. To reduce the risk of colliding with the offshore facilities the bridge crew have to pay particular attention to the planning phase prior to the operation. The bridge crew also has among other things to complete a checklist with regard to critical factors before they enter the safety zone. The items in the checklist will wary from shipping company to shipping company, but will typically include establishment of communication lines with the offshore facility, assessment of weather conditions and specific checkpoints regarding the status of the technical system. If the bridge crew is going to conduct the operation by means of a dynamic positioning system, it is further required that the bridge crew conducts a technical test of the