To err is… all too human

However, Captain Stuart Duffield of LOC adds that there’s often a dearth of information about mistakes “because no-one wants to own up to them”.

Which is a pity, he says, because it could help another operator to avoid the same trap. “For example, one drift off incident was a mystery, until you saw that the light switch was right next to the manual / DP selection switch which didn’t have a cover on.” Even then, no one accepted that it might have been a simple error, “human nature is such that you get used to what you see every day” points out Mr Duffield, even if it’s patently dangerous.

He adds: “It’s not simply the individual operator, the companies themselves have a culture that could benefit from being more open.”

Further, Mr Duffield says that while on one hand there’s reason to be happy about the vigour of the sector, on the other “any meaningful level of experience is becoming extremely diluted”. He points out that getting a certificate is only the start, and absorbing what you really need to know takes years, “the worst assumption someone can make is thinking that they now know the job because they have their certificate”.

The other part of the issue is the equipment itself. The systems have become so robust that it’s lulled operators into a false sense of security, the mean time between failures in recent times being measured in months or even years rather than weeks or days.

However, these moments still happen – and it looks as if there may even be more of them: for one the hardware is now aging, which means some kit could now be 10 or 15 years old. So, he says: “The vessel can be put in a great deal of danger because everybody has overconfidence in the system.”

Secondly the newer kinds of technology can catch even experienced DPOs off guard: “While GPS failure modes are quite well documented, such as the issue of radio waves bouncing off a nearby rig, radius and radascans and inertial navigation systems, for example, are relatively new position reference technologies and their failure modes are not as widely understood.”

The problem is that while simulators can play a part in updates and there may be very good reasons for getting people back for a refresher every five years, there’s a huge cost implication and no obvious source of funds to back it up: “So who pays for it?”

By Stevie Knight