4 April 2025
The crew – and the Commanding Officer
– of the Navy ship Manawanui were under trained and the boat
was not up to the task it was doing when it grounded on a
Samoan reef.
Multiple failures of the crew, the ship
and the Navy itself have been identified in a damning report
by a Court of Inquiry into the sinking of the coast of Upolu
in October which occurred after it was left in autopilot and
could not turn.
The report also contains a full
transcript of the dramatic night. Including the captain
telling the crew they would survive if they abandoned
ship.
The Manawanui has been conducting hydrographic
surveys of the reef ahead of the Commonwealth Heads of
Government meeting, something neither the ship nor the crew
were properly equipped to do, when it ran
aground.
There was no one on board who was qualified
enough to carry out the hydrographic surveying that the ship
was tasked with doing and the ship itself was not cleared
for that work, the court found.
There were not enough
people on board to be able to have an effective watch
rotation to prevent fatigue during the prolonged survey
task, the Court found.
Out of 45 people on board,
there were “20 personnel deficiencies,” it
found.
There were weaknesses in training – that
enabled some people to hold posts on the ship without the
necessary levels of proficiency or experience.
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The
report details the Captains word to her crew as they
prepared to leave the ship after it had grounded several
times and it was clear it had to be abandoned.
“This
isn’t a great situation, however I have faith that you all
know what you need to do. We’ll get to our liferaft
stations, we’ll get in our liferafts and we’ll survive this
and then we’ll wait for help to arrive.”
The person in
charge of the ship at the time of the incident was
“distracted”, which the Court of Inquiry found contributed
to a lack of situational awareness.
Meanwhile, the
role of the supervisor was “not clearly defined” and they
had inadequate situational awareness and understanding of
how the ship operated, it found.
The ship sailed a day
later than scheduled, because of an azimuth thruster defect
prior to sailing.
The Court of Inquiry found time
pressure influenced the way the survey task was conducted
and “that time pressure could have been avoided if the task
had been properly planned.”
“The risk management
culture was found to be deficient and weighted heavily on
achieving the mission without the necessary balance to
ensure the mission was completed safely,” it
found.
The Court found no errors with the ship’s
engines during the grounding.
“At the time of the
grounding, there is no evidence that the ship had a loss of
power or a steering/control failure,” it
said.
Speaking to media a short time ago, Chief of
Navy Rear Admiral Garin Golding said the Navy will have a
“relentless focus on continued improvement.”
“I want
to assure everyone, including most importantly, the Navy and
the wider Defence Force, just how seriously on taking the
response to this report,” he said.
“The safety of our
people and the missions we undertake are my main
priority.”
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