Conducting monthly drills during the fishing season can help crew members respond more effectively to an emergency. There are hundreds of cases where fishermen attributed their survival to having conducted emergency drills.
It makes sense that if you repeatedly practice actions that need to be taken in a crisis at sea, you are more likely to react in a more effective way. Monthly drills are also a requirement for documented fishing vessels operating beyond the federal boundary line or with more than 16 people onboard.
46 CFR 28.270 states: The master or individual in charge of each vessel must ensure that drills are conducted and instruction is given to each individual on board at least once each month. Instruction may be provided in conjunction with drills or at other times and places provided it ensures that each individual is familiar with their duties and their responses.
It also goes on to say: Drills must be conducted on board the vessel as if there were an actual emergency and must include participation by all individuals on board, breaking out and using emergency equipment, testing of all alarm and detection systems, donning protective clothing, and donning immersion suits, if the vessel is so equipped. In addition, it states the master or individual in charge of a vessel must ensure that a safety orientation is given to each individual on board … and the safety orientation must explain the emergency instructions required by 46 CFR 28.265.
A drill is required to be conducted by a formally trained person—a drill conductor. Currently, a drill can be conducted by someone who’s not a member of the crew, but it’s better to be self-sufficient and have a drill conductor be a crew member. One-to-two-day drill conductor courses are available through AMSEA, the North Pacific Fishing Vessel Owners’ Association (NPFVOA) and other organizations.
An effective drill should be all of the following:
Realistic: Examples of drill scenarios can be taken from personal examples of your own or other fishermen’s close calls or emergencies. They also can be taken from examples of emergencies found in NTSB case studies at: https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations. Or you can have fun making up your own scenarios.
Spontaneous: Drills shouldn’t always be announced ahead of time. Find a time in which critical work is not taking place and announce the drill. A card announcing a fire, person overboard, flooding or abandon ship can be placed somewhere on the vessel and whomever finds the card starts the drill. However, drills always should be announced as just that—a drill, to avoid confusion and upsetting crew or search-and-rescue sources by initiating false alarms.
Hands-on: Only 10% of what we read and 20% of what we hear someone tell us is remembered three days later. On the other hand, 90% of what we do is remembered three days later. Familiarity with a vessel’s safety equipment builds better memory retention when crew is practicing with safety gear in a hands-on way. Practice builds muscle memory so that people use survival gear in an efficient way. Fishermen are more likely to use emergency gear when they’re familiar with it. On a vessel, there’s no option to just walk away.
Progressive: For new crew members, safety drills should start with simple walk-throughs and as the season progresses, build to more complicated scenarios to keep them on their toes. Running or going downstairs backwards should be avoided.
Filled with teamwork: An efficient, productive fishing crew demonstrates teamwork. Crew should have specific duties in an emergency. If drills are not practiced, an emergency often breaks down into an every-person-for-himself reaction, with some emergency tasks overlooked and other tasks suffering from too many people trying to do the same thing. Build on the team you already have when you are fishing. Drills are a great way to learn to trust each other and have each other’s backs in an emergency. All crew members including the captain are expected to participate.
Positive: Drills should not be used to harass, punish, intimidate, bully or frustrate anyone. People learn to avoid what hurts them. Drills should be used to break the tedium and monotony of a long fishing season. Use your creativity and have fun by rewarding those who help others in the drill, don an immersion suit quicker or come up with a safety tip.
Debriefed: A drill is not finished until it is debriefed by crew. Each crew member should be able to talk about what was learned and how to react more effectively. Can safety gear be stored so that it’s more accessible? Did one crew member have too much to do and others not enough? Is there any other safety gear that should be obtained or maintained, such as extra fire extinguishers, overboard retrieval device, bilge alarms, or PFDs? Be sure to log your drill even if not required and have all crew members sign. This is good protection for you.
There are four general emergencies to be covered in a complete set of drills: crew overboard, fire, flooding and abandon ship. On small to moderate-sized fishing vessels, each of these four emergencies should only take about 15 minutes if well planned.
One of four drill contingencies practiced once a week will complete your drills for the month. It’s not a heavy lift. If you own an iOS phone you can download the free FVdrills app.
FVdrills has a safety orientation list, contains scenarios to initiate drills, checks off points for debriefing and can pick random drills for you to use and a way to log the time it took to do certain emergency tasks. You also can send evidence of the drill you conducted at sea to a shoreside facility.
Practice increases your odds. In an emergency, you don’t rise to the occasion, you fall to the level of your training.
The Alaska Marine Safety Education Association (AMSEA) has a mission is to reduce injury and death in the marine and freshwater environment through education and training provided by a network of marine safety instructors. The Sitka, Alaska-based organization has been offering marine safety training to commercial fishermen and thousands of other mariners since 1985.
More information on marine safety topics can be found at www.amsea.org