(1st of 2 Parts)
The tragic loss of lives in the
sinking of the MV Nirvana off the waters of Ormoc may, at the onset, be
attributed to any of these factors: The reported big waves that hit the
boat despite the absence of a typhoon warning advisory; a turn made by
the crew that that was allegedly too fast; the age of the ferry;
and finally, overloading.
Or a confluence of these reasons may
have doomed the vessel said to have ferried over 200 passengers and in doing
that exceeded its carrying capacity – a very serious concern for which the
U.S., Canadian and U.K. governments have issued travel advisories to warn their
employees and citizens against inter-island ferry travel in the Philippines,
including on smaller roll-on, roll-off (ro-ro) vessels.
“There have been five major
inter-island ferryboat accidents in the last two years, one with significant
loss of lives. The safety record of ferryboats is such that U.S. government
employees are advised not to take inter-island ferry services unless they are
the only means of transportation available,” said the US travel advisory to its
embassy and consular officials.
Overloaded
The U.K. government warned:
“Avoid travel on ferries if possible. Ferries are often overloaded, lack
necessary lifesaving equipment, are not adequately maintained and have
incomplete passenger manifests.”
Canada’s advisory, on the other
hand, read: “Sea travel in the Philippines is hazardous. You should not
travel on ferries unless no other means of travel are available. Ferries are
often overloaded, lack the necessary equipment and are not properly maintained.”
The jarring reality is that the
majority of ferryboats and ro-ro vessels (400-5,000 GRT) serving Philippine
inter-island routes are old and substandard vessels. A maritime insider
has described the dilapidated and ancient ferries as “floating coffins” or
“accidents waiting to happen.”
For example, the average age of
Philippine ro-ro vessels up to 5,000 tons leaves a lot to be desired. A total
of 16 ro-ro vessels are aged 41-45 years, seven have already seen service from
46 to 50 years, 10 are 36 to 40 years old, while eight apiece are in the 26-30
and 31-35 age brackets. Only seven vessels are in the 0-5 bracket, two apiece
are in the 6-10 and 11-15 brackets, four are aged 16-20 and five vessels are
aged 21-25.
Hard facts
A paper entitled Road Map to
the Complete Modernization of Small RoRos identified these key facts
regarding small ro-ro ferries in the country which can be assumed to be also
the case when it comes to non-ro-ro vessels. It said that most of the ro-ros in
the Philippines are over 20 years old because they are imported second-hand
from Japan, where they are retired once they reach 20 years old.
The boats imported from Japan were
“built generally for calm inland waters and that a one-meter wave is already
dangerous for these types of vessels. They are fine for travel to sheltered
waters like Laguna de Bay or Taal Lake, but are dangerous when used in open
waters in the Philippines connected to the China Sea.”
Worse, “Filipino owners have the
dangerous practice of adding another deck to these second-hand ro-ros in order
to add more passenger capacity,” said the paper, which noted that in the recent
sinking of a passenger ferry off Jeju Island in South Korea, “it has been
revealed that another deck was added to the said vessel.”
Appalling regularity
“Headlines of ro-ro and ferries
sinking in the Philippines appear with appalling regularity. One cannot help
but wonder if these deaths and accidents could have been prevented with a more
modern fleet. When one reviews MARINA’s incident reports from 2006 to 2014, all
of the four vessels which had sunk due to extreme weather were more than 20
years old,” said the paper.
“The recent sinking of the MV
Maharlika II was caused by water coming in from the steering gear. Said vessels
was 30 years old when she capsized. All of the 22 ro-ro vessels that had
encountered machinery problems have been in operation for at least 20
years. While there is no academic study highlighting the strict correlation of
vessel age with maritime incidents, it is significant that national maritime
agencies, like Japan’s, don’t allow ro-ro vessels to operate past a certain
vessel age.”
Lives sacrificed
“These highlight the reality that
maritime operators, managers and entities recognize that older vessels have
more maintenance issues and grow less safe over time unless aggressively
maintained. At a certain point, it makes less economic sense to keep investing
in maintenance instead of just selling the vessel and buying a new one.”
“The Philippines is frequently the
buyer of these old vessels, ones that likely had less maintenance in the last
years of operation since owners planned on selling them anyway,” it said. Once
sold, the incentive for aggressive maintenance diminished even more. Without
clear government guidelines to ensure vessel quality, the value of human lives
factor less in the algebra of profit and loss,” it said.
(To be continued)
Image by: Balitaboss
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