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Phuket tour boats overturn in storm, rescue mission launched


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13 minutes ago, gk10002000 said:
On ‎7‎/‎5‎/‎2018 at 9:23 PM, pistachios said:

I haven't dived for a while around Phuket but the biggest boat I have ever boarded had about 40 divers max, it seems incredible to host 97 people on a diving boat.

How can a boat this size can capsize in those waters? It's not the roaring forties...

Is it like an old big fishing boat refurbished and with many decks added that would drastically worsen its stability?

The number seems crazily too big but doesn't surprise me.  Will wait to see the details.

These were families of package-tour Chinese snorkelers, very few actual divers or associated equipment on board. With a boat that size it was probably luxurious for them.

There are pictures of the boat available to give you an idea of it's size and capabilities without having to make ill informed guesses.

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21 hours ago, lvr181 said:

Unfortunately, as always, MONEY is king in the kingdom!

 

"valuable lessons will be learned". You're right, only excuses will be forthcoming.

"Empowered harbourmaster"? Have to give that person a huge pay rise (along with draconian conditions e.g. jail for not doing the job properly) to offset the brown envelopes.

 

I too, am dreaming. :sad:

Thai cowboys

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18 hours ago, saminoz said:

Proper seamen check the forecast regularly, not just before you leave the harbour.

The sea is extremely variable and you need to keep aware of the changes.

Not checking the forecast regularly while on a full day trip in the monsson season seems to me to be entirely negligent, especially when entrusted with the lives of so any passengers.

 

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2 hours ago, Wilsonandson said:

The captain is always the last to leave his sinking ship.

Not in Thailand.
tapatalk_1530924612205.jpeg

His boat was overloaded and why didn't he check the shipping forecast before setting sail?

Just look at this clip. Surely this weather had been forecast.
 

Same same Italy. :sad: 

Boat founders on rocks and the "Captain" is among the first to get off the boat.

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1 hour ago, Old Croc said:

If you were surfing at the time that storm hit I presume you're now at the Krabi bus station trying to convince them to give  a free ride back to Phuket to an old codger in boardies and carrying a plank.

 

Near my place is a German owned RIB factory build as stolidly as the reputation of the owners nationality. It's survived for many years and countless storms without a problem.

This is what happened to the roofing in the wind the other day:

IMG_0358.JPG

 

i caught a late night flight to bkk as scheduled in advance

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9 hours ago, manarak said:
9 hours ago, atyclb said:

 

 

defending how things are done locally

 

hmmm, that sounds real intelligent

this forum needs a "dislike" button

 

try making an argument about why you dislike rather than clicking a mouse.

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3 hours ago, stevenl said:

The boat wasn't overloaded and this weather was not in the forecast.

Whilst you are so busy defending this moron, and you seem to know so much about the sea routes and boats in the area, perhaps you can enlighten us as to what all those lovely medal ribbons on his chest are for?

I am a very experienced mariner, both on large vessels and yachts and I have never ever managed to earn even one of those lovely ribbons!

Putting everything aside, speaking as a very experienced skipper who made many, many trips training youngsters on their first sails, the ultimate responsibility lies with the skipper and for him to appear in an interview, still immaculate in his toy box uniform when he has saved his own ass before ensuring the safety of his passengers and subsequently been responsible for the deaths of half his passengers is simply...............Thainess, I guess.

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3 minutes ago, saminoz said:

Whilst you are so busy defending this moron, and you seem to know so much about the sea routes and boats in the area, perhaps you can enlighten us as to what all those lovely medal ribbons on his chest are for?

I am a very experienced mariner, both on large vessels and yachts and I have never ever managed to earn even one of those lovely ribbons!

Putting everything aside, speaking as a very experienced skipper who made many, many trips traning youngsters on their first sails, the ultimate responsibility lies with the skipper and for him to appear in an interview, still immaculate in his toy box uniform when he has saved his own ass before ensurng the saferty of his passengers and subsequently been responsible for the deaths of half his passengers is simply...............Thianess, I geuss.

ribbons on chest is a "thai thing"

 

if you are a teacher in 1st:grade, you also carry ribbons.

 

ribbons can be decoded on internet.

 

breakdown of the ribbons:  = the king,  geographical location, rank, marine, etc.

it piles up quickly

 

 

 

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One more thing:  In the video clip they claim that there were 127 Chinese tourists aboard the tub.  Is this hyperbole or hae we been mislead by false figures to avooid the overloading charge and/or save face?

What was truly horrifying was the obvious fear of the Chinese passengers.

Sad, tragic and completely avoidable

Phuket Boat Load.png

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3 hours ago, Old Croc said:

I was just trying to work out what was going on in the clip at post 232.

Hard to say for sure, but it seems they might have lost one or more overboard and were trying to retrieve them. A small boat had been let out on rope and there appeared to be heads in the water. This would explain the stern into the wind.

A crewman, not the captain, was at the helm at the time.

 

Excellent observation. From the very first video I saw of the boat appearing to be swamped at the stern I could not understand what the captain was doing. But now we see the recent video from the boat it appears that a rescue was in progress so boat stern to waves. Bad call by captain. 

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15 minutes ago, saminoz said:

Whilst you are so busy defending this moron, and you seem to know so much about the sea routes and boats in the area, perhaps you can enlighten us as to what all those lovely medal ribbons on his chest are for?

I am a very experienced mariner, both on large vessels and yachts and I have never ever managed to earn even one of those lovely ribbons!

Putting everything aside, speaking as a very experienced skipper who made many, many trips traning youngsters on their first sails, the ultimate responsibility lies with the skipper and for him to appear in an interview, still immaculate in his toy box uniform when he has saved his own ass before ensurng the saferty of his passengers and subsequently been responsible for the deaths of half his passengers is simply...............Thianess, I geuss.

Who is defending 'this moron'? I have said it a few times already, and will say it again, he made a or a few mistakes.

 

Information like 'the boat was overloaded, there was a weather warning, boats were prohibited from going out', are simply not true.

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7 minutes ago, saminoz said:

One more thing:  In the video clip they claim that there were 127 Chinese tourists aboard the tub.  Is this hyperbole or hae we been mislead by false figures to avooid the overloading charge and/or save face?

What was truly horrifying was the obvious fear of the Chinese passengers.

Sad, tragic and completely avoidable

There has been some confusion about the numbers, it looks like 93 or 97 on Phoenix, 12 crew/staff on Phenox and 39 on the other boat.

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4 minutes ago, stevenl said:

Who is defending 'this moron'? I have said it a few times already, and will say it again, he made a or a few mistakes.

 

Information like 'the boat was overloaded, there was a weather warning, boats were prohibited from going out', are simply not true.

Tell that to Prawit.  According to him they were told not to go out between the 4th ad 6th and ignored the warnings and would subsequently be held responsible.

Are you contradicting the DPM?!!!!!

No medals for you!

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1 minute ago, saminoz said:

Tell that to Prawit.  According to him they were told not to go out between the 4th ad 6th and ignored the warnings and would subsequently be held responsible.

Are you contradicting the DPM?!!!!!

Damn StevenL, you could lose your sideline.

 

He is covering the Thai gov's ass. 

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1 minute ago, saminoz said:

Tell that to Prawit.  According to him they were told not to go out between the 4th ad 6th and ignored the warnings and would subsequently be held responsible.

Are you contradicting the DPM?!!!!!

No medals for you!

I'll make life easy for you. Just go to the TMD website, and show us the weather warning that was issued for the 5th.

 

Never mind, I have done it for you:

1 The strong wind and waves with heavy rain over the South 4 July 7, 2018
2 The strong wind and waves with heavy rain over the South 3 July 6, 2018
3 The strong wind and waves with heavy rain over the South 2 July 6, 2018
4 The strong wind and waves with heavy rain over the South 1 July 6, 2018
5 The strong wind and waves over the Andaman Sea and the upper Gulf 36 June 20, 2018
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Pretty well all been said  but come on Royal Thai  Marine & Harbours Department why did you not stop them?

With modern weather forecasting & communication channels sounds like the only reason these poor souls

went out was "GREED"

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On 7/6/2018 at 11:55 AM, saminoz said:

Exactly right!  Anyone with a reasonable amount of seagoing experience should be able to recognise this scenario and act accordingly.

As the old adage says: "the right time to take in sail in such conditions, is when you first think of it".

The "captain's" experience and qualifications should be put under a microscope, as should the construction, modification history, maintenace and safety inspection records of this passenger vessel.

Of course, this being Thailand..............................

unfortunately that would be like reading the beano

  

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On 7/6/2018 at 9:03 AM, happy chappie said:

A few of these would be handy.cant understand how a place like phuket with 10,000s of people going into the sea each day haven't got anything like this..

IMG_2422.JPG

IMG_2423.JPG

Quite simple:

 

1) No return on investment

2) In many western countries manned by volunteers, doing the job nearly for free

3) In many western countries substantially financed by donations. However, giving to sea rescue doesn't promise you a better afterlife, whereas donating gold to a carefully selected wat ...

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12 minutes ago, BernieOnTour said:

Quite simple:

 

1) No return on investment

2) In many western countries manned by volunteers, doing the job nearly for free

3) In many western countries substantially financed by donations. However, giving to sea rescue doesn't promise you a better afterlife, whereas donating gold to a carefully selected wat ...

 

 

Thailand got their EMS service, free ambulances and the first free hospitals from charitable donations, your assumptions are way off.

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7 hours ago, stevenl said:

I am on a boat to the Racha islands about 3 days a week, and after reading and watching will try to explain what I think happened in lay man's words.

 

To return from Racha to Phuket are 2 ways, straight, after 16km or so open sea keeping Coral island on the right, or after about the same open sea distance keeping Coral island on the left. First option is fastest and offers shelter from the wind coming from the right earlier, but means having the wind and waves more coming from the side.

The captain choose the shortest route, the boat being quite high up got pushed left, water/waves entered on the back, pumps couldn't handle it, boat listed and sunk. He should have taken the longer route going more against the waves in stead of from the side. 

So it seems quite obvious that the the man steering the boat ( im not calling him a captain)is a clueless moron who should of known better after probably doing this trip god knows how many times.there were a few boats caught out but only this one had any major problems.as a diver do you know if you have jet ski jackets or proper life jackets?

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On 7/6/2018 at 5:15 PM, stevenl said:

What would that lesson be please?

I could come up with a few:

 

Lesson one: the current weather warning system is too generic and therefore too easily ignored. With so many people out on the sea every day and the monsoon season capable of producing such ugly surprises as last Thursday’s one, Phuket and environs could benefit from having a real-time weather monitoring and warning system in place (supplementing TMD’s more general forecasts and warnings). Phuket already has a 120/240km radius weather radar. A trained pair of eyes monitoring those radar images would be able to see if any approaching weather looks potentially more violent than the regular monsoon shower (e.g. based on rain intensity and the width and travel speed of the front), and issue warnings accordingly. In most cases it would give those out on the sea an hour or two to anticipate the bad weather approaching. (I’m assuming that some kind of communication infrastructure between port authorities and seagoing ships is already in place; if not, it should be of course).

 

Lesson two: seemingly not all boat crew know how to safely ride out a bad storm out on sea. If true, it may be a good idea for the industry to invest in some education. Teach boat crews how to recognize potentially dangerous weather and how to respond to it (both in terms of sailing and preparing passengers for possible mayhem).

 

Lesson three: the ‘life jackets’ in use on many of these boats keep people afloat when snorkeling, but are of little use, or worse, increase the chance of drowning in case of shipwreck. Devices and/or protocol needs to be reviewed and changed.

 

If the industry (with or without government help) cannot organize this centrally, individual operators can at least take care of #2 and #3.

 

My two or rather, three cents.   

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13 minutes ago, leftorright said:

I could come up with a few:

 

Lesson one: the current weather warning system is too generic and therefore too easily ignored. With so many people out on the sea every day and the monsoon season capable of producing such ugly surprises as last Thursday’s one, Phuket and environs could benefit from having a real-time weather monitoring and warning system in place (supplementing TMD’s more general forecasts and warnings). Phuket already has a 120/240km radius weather radar. A trained pair of eyes monitoring those radar images would be able to see if any approaching weather looks potentially more violent than the regular monsoon shower (e.g. based on rain intensity and the width and travel speed of the front), and issue warnings accordingly. In most cases it would give those out on the sea an hour or two to anticipate the bad weather approaching. (I’m assuming that some kind of communication infrastructure between port authorities and seagoing ships is already in place; if not, it should be of course).

 

Lesson two: seemingly not all boat crew know how to safely ride out a bad storm out on sea. If true, it may be a good idea for the industry to invest in some education. Teach boat crews how to recognize potentially dangerous weather and how to respond to it (both in terms of sailing and preparing passengers for possible mayhem).

 

Lesson three: the ‘life jackets’ in use on many of these boats keep people afloat when snorkeling, but are of little use, or worse, increase the chance of drowning in case of shipwreck. Devices and/or protocol needs to be reviewed and changed.

 

If the industry (with or without government help) cannot organize this centrally, individual operators can at least take care of #2 and #3.

 

My two or rather, three cents.   

Good suggestions imo, and a nice change from the bland 'things must change' etc comments, without commentators realising what is at the root cause.

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9 hours ago, BernieOnTour said:
On ‎7‎/‎6‎/‎2018 at 2:03 PM, happy chappie said:

A few of these would be handy.cant understand how a place like phuket with 10,000s of people going into the sea each day haven't got anything like this..

IMG_2422.JPG

IMG_2423.JPG

Quite simple:

 

1) No return on investment

2) In many western countries manned by volunteers, doing the job nearly for free

3) In many western countries substantially financed by donations. However, giving to sea rescue doesn't promise you a better afterlife, whereas donating gold to a carefully selected wat ...

Phuket has a major Navel base about 7 or 8 nautical miles from the scene of the sinking. Navy ships were there quickly to lead the search and continue to search for survivors/bodies.

11.JPG

 

Usually when there is an incident like this, numerous fishing , tourist and other vessels are on the scene to lend assistance almost immediately. It's an extremely busy part of the ocean. Check out the video of many boats holding station during the storm.

Also, I seem to recall a local rescue agency being presented with boats similar to the second picture some years ago. I couldn't find a reference to it now and don't know if they are in service.

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