On December 10, 2020, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board issued a summary report detailing the most important maritime safety lessons learned from marine incidents during the year 2019. The report is known as the Safer Seas Digest. The Safer Seas Digest 2019 includes lessons learned from 30 different incidents in 2019. These included allisions,…
D/V CONCEPTION caught fire and sank off the coast of California in 2019. The incident killed 34 people. On December 1, 2020, the captain of the Vessel was indicted on federal manslaughter charges under The Seaman’s Manslaughter Statute, codified at 18 U.S.C. § 1115. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles, the captain…
In the wake of the deadly fire aboard D/V CONCEPTION in September 2019, lawmakers have advanced a new fire safety bill for small passenger vessels, the Small Passenger Vessel Safety Act. The legislation was proposed by Senator Dianne Feinstein and Representatives Salud Carbajal and Julia Brownley. It was rolled into the National Defense Authorization Act…
During the Oct. 20, 2020 meeting of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, the NTSB determined the probable cause of the Sept., 2019 fire casualty aboard D/V CONCEPTION was the failure of Truth Aquatics, Inc., the owner and operator of the vessel, to provide effective oversight of the boat and crew operations. Specifically, they failed…
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has publicly released voluminous documentary evidence relating to the fire aboard D/V CONCEPTION on September 2, 2019, which resulted in the deaths of 34 people. The only survivors of the incident near Santa Cruz Island in California were five crewmembers who dove into the water for safety. Everyone else…
