The Observer, September 2006
Report analyzes the human factor in marine oil spills
When the Exxon Valdez impaled itself on Bligh Reef 17 years ago, every piece of equipment on the ship was working perfectly.
What didn’t work right was the crew. It was a navigational mistake, not a hardware malfunction, that put the ship on the reef.
The Exxon Valdez spill of 1989 is an example of a marine disaster caused by human error. Photo courtesy of Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council
Like most non-natural disasters, North America’s worst oil spill was caused by human error. The same is true of more recent accidents in Alaska waters, including the incidents involving the cargo vessels Selendang Ayu and Cougar Ace in the North Pacific.
Now, a 50-page study commissioned by the council reviews the role of human error in oil spills and other marine accidents, and attempts to identify ways to reduce it.
Among the study’s key findings:
• Up to 80 percent of oil spills and other marine accidents can be attributed to human factors, either individual error or organization failure.
• Technological improvements such as double hulls on tankers can reduce the severity of an oil spill, but they cannot interrupt the chain of events leading to the accident. In fact, technological improvements can have the perverse effect of making an accident more likely, because the ship becomes more complicated to operate, because the ship owner may conclude crew size can be reduced, or because a perceived higher level of safety results in the crew being more willing to take chances.
The study lists several recommendations for finding out more about the human factor in oil spills, and reducing its role in accidents. They include – among other things – creating a mandatory near-miss reporting system; promoting and applying industry practices known to reduce accidents risks from human factors; and incorporating an analysis of human factors in risk assessments for oil spills from vessels.
The study, titled “An Assessment of the Role of Human Factors in Oil Spills from Vessels,” was prepared by Nuka Research and Planning Group. It is available as a 1.1 megabyte download from www.pwsrcac.org/docs/d0028900.pdf.