South Korean ferry MV Sewol flips, 1/2 sunk in shallows, people trapped.....

Ah, yes, much better to have the passengers avoid any nasty on deck hazards, and to all be dead together in a nice convenient place where their bodies can be found.

 

As I said " and then things happened too suddenly'. I will not judge their conduct without knowing the facts, I will judge you as an *** however.

 

35 minutes to order the evacuation. Too slow.

 

I dont think there was any reliable way for officers to assess how long the ferry would remain listing - the scenario would take days to model on a computer with all available data.

For a panicked officer, getting data of varied quality, advice from on shore observers, picturing lots of school kids in the cold, fast running water - I bet I would hang out for local boats to come alongside for a safe evacuation.

 

If the captain knew enough to evacuate himself he should have evacuated the passengers.

 

Rudder went full over then the unstable tub fell over, maybe?

 

Captain going down with his ship is decidedly passé these days, for better or worse.

 

Now that I did the math on paper and not in my head, you are correct. 200 yds (~ 1/10 NM or 0.1 deg lat) per minute is 6 knots not 3. So between 08:48:37 and 08:49:37 she advanced ~ 600 yds which gives a speed ~18 knots over ground, not 9.

 

No of Crew

It is now claimed that the entire crew of 15 is in custody. Does anyone else think that a crew of 15 to operate such a ship is extremely small - or are they only counting the 'deck' crew rather than the 'engineers' and other 'hotel' staff?

From another source it now appears to be 24:
15 seaman crew (8 navigation, 7 engineering) and 9 service crew: cooks, stewards etc
Even with 24 the number for an overnight passenger ferry seems extremely low!

 

To Stay or Go - is there any Question?

For anyone who is in charge of a Ro-Pax vessel of this sort that is listing to 45 degrees and flooding, there is only one end - capsize - and that requires rapid evacuation - or have we learned nothing from the last 61 years of Ro-Ro tragedies? All should know that leaving passengers inside such a vessel would be certain death - thank goodness that enough of the fitter students managed to realise this and scramble out to safe themselves

 

51 years of ro ro taught us that cats are safer

 

I've read the crew size was 29 and 30, from different sources, of which 22 survived.Also crew size max can be 36. Perhaps it was lower since the PAX size was about half of capacity

 

The 15 crew in custody reportedly were the navigation watch standers on duty at the time of the casualty. There are no reports of how many total crew were aboard.

http://gcaptain.com/15-navigation-watchstanders-south-korean-ferry-face-prosecution/

 

What other RO-Pax ferries have listed for that long then rolled over in calm water ?

 

S. Korean prime minister resigns over ferry sinking