‘No Dedicated Lookout’ in Leadup to U.S. Strategic Tanker Ramming, Says Investigation

Visibility was as low as a quarter-mile in fog and neither ship involved had a dedicated lookout in the ramming of a U.S. wartime supply aviation fuel tanker off the coast of England, accident investigators say.

The United Kingdom’s Maritime Accident Investigation Board (MAIB) has released an interim report into the March 10th collision between container ship Solong and U.S.-flagged chemical tanker Stenna Immaculate, revealing new details about the incident. Among them are security-camera stills recording the moment of impact, with the two ships catching fire.

The Stenna Immaculate was at anchor at the time of the incident, having arrived the previous day and was awaiting a free berth at a nearby marine terminal to unload its cargo, the equivalent of 220,000 oil barrels of jet fuel. The Solong, meanwhile, was proceeding south on its regular route delivering containerised general freight.

Cowley Maritime Services

Despite visibility at sea “reported to be patchy” on the morning of the collision, and at times as little as 0.25 nautical miles (.28 miles), neither the anchored or underway vessel had “had a dedicated lookout on the bridge”, MAIB states. Both ships were found to be well above their minimum crewing requirement and the captain of the Solong, a Russian citizen, was logged as on the bridge at the time of the incident.

As MAIB note of the body’s own purpose, the “sole objective” of their investigation is to prevent future accidents, and their reports apportion no blame and are inadmissible in court. Nevertheless, in terms of learning those lessons, the body said as its investigation goes forwards they will be considering the navigation and watchkeeping practices of the vessels, as well as how the crew and fatigue may have contributed to events.

One person was killed in the incident. MAIB says Able seaman Mark Pernia was believed to have been on the bow of the Solong at the time of the smash, the worst-impacted area. His body was never found, efforts to find him immediately after the collision being “hampered by the severity of the fire”.

Maritime incidents of this magnitude are relatively rare and getting rarer, in general, and particularly in the waters of developed nations. This event gained a much greater magnitude of public attention after it was revealed one of the ships involved, the rammed party, was one of only a handful of U.S.-flagged and owned fuel supply ships contracted to be available to deliver supplies in case of emergency or war.

Interest was further focussed after it was revealed the captain of the vessel that smashed into the stationary U.S. tanker is a Russian citizen. He has been arrested and is being investigated on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter.