Two cargo ships collide in the Suez Canal

Posted on by

Question for maritime experts: how does something as foreseeable and as slow as this occur?

First, I’ll wager it was a case of “dueling insurance companies.”  And second, I’ll wager it was also a matter, for Hapag Lloyd, of “how many zeroes do I write behind the check” due to the negligent actions of the captain of the M/V Colombo Express?

BZ

 

 Share
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

8 thoughts on “Two cargo ships collide in the Suez Canal”

    • Really; how stupid can you be, to turn hard aport into a ship that clearly possesses the maritime “right of way”?

      BZ

  2. Whoever the Captain is, he’s an impatient bastard. :/

    The captain of the Colombo Express made two critical but parallel errors in navigation rules.

    1-trying to overtake to starboard without sufficient distance in the channel to complete the maneuver.
    2-overtaking with shoal water to starboard, and not having sufficient room to maneuver.

    If the captain of the Colombo had ordered the throttle to slow ahead to allow the Maersk ship to open the distance, this would never have happened.

    • Gnetlemen,

      Please remember there were already pilots on board of both ships.I know this channel very well. Somebody (Por Said Port Control or pilots) made a very bad arrangements. Master of course is always responsible but first mistake was probably not his.Those ships should not be at the same time at the same place, usualy ther should be 1-1,5 nm distance from ship to ship during. Colombo Express was already in the channel Maersk was coming in from Port Said Container Terminal having Hapag ship on her starboard side !!!! ( who has the right of the way???)Who allowed her to do it when there was already ship in the channel ????? German vessel was just trying to avoid collision ..not overtaking ! Remeber you can not stop or slow down such a vessel in 15 s when somebody jumps in front of you. Most probably channel efect kicked her bow into center of the channel sucking in the stern (every navigator should know it) or less probably steering failed with hard to port causing collision
      So please do not judge the master if you do not know what happened.

      • Piotr, good comments, I didn’t consider that pilots would be onboard, or that the port control didn’t consider the position of both ships. However, I will stay with my original comment, the captain of the Colombo was at fault regardless of whomever was navigating the ship, because he is the captain, and he could have directed others to take different actions that would prevented this incident.

  3. Who knows what that captain was thinking, but he new he was going to hit well before it happened. A ship of that size dos not slow down or change direction like a car!

    Gerhard

Comments are closed.