Proteksan & Turquoise Superyacht "Yogi" Sinks!

Hi,

I guess as the shipyard have proclaimed themselves totally exonerated the chances that the crew will will turn out to be blamed have just increased somewhat.

Blame the crew is not a new phenomenon and is regularly practised by many yards large and small, the famous and the not so famous.

This is kind of amusing. It seems that the cruise industry is asking the IMO to enhance access to accident information.

"Washington - Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) is recommending enhancements to regulations about the reporting of casualties at sea, as part of the Cruise Industry Operational Safety Review, launched by CLIA and its member lines immediately following the Concordia incident.

Specifically, CLIA is recommending that the International Maritime Organization (IMO) expressly and more clearly require flag states to report all “very serious marine casualties.” Very serious marine casualties are defined by the IMO and include any marine casualty resulting in a passenger or crewmember fatality, the complete loss of a ship, or serious damage to the marine environment. CLIA requested that Member States of the IMO consider clarifying existing requirements via an amendment to the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), which provides comprehensive global mandates on safety equipment and procedures.

“Ensuring the consistency of reporting will benefit both the general public and the industry by improving awareness and transparency,” said Christine Duffy, President and CEO of CLIA. “While marine casualties in the cruise industry are extremely rare, and our singular priority is always to prevent them, we believe these recommendations will ensure consistency across the industry and greater transparency for all our stakeholders.”

I read on a builder's forum where this vessel capsized in adverse weather. Ok, that we know based upon pictures. The unwritten question posed was did a capsize occur before or after flooding? If before, then all sorts of flooding could have occurred. Speculation of course ---

Hi,

If it capsized as a direct result of being in the sea conditions we saw in the video I think the yard has a lot to answer for in regard to stability.

A statement like that should have everyone on a yacht from the same yard have a thorough look at their Stability Booklet and maybe have it all re measured and calculated to see if the booklet delivered actually represents the boat as delivered. It wouldn't be the first time a booklet was submitted that contained the maritime version of "poetic license".

If this really is the case this would tend to fly in the face of what they said about the investigations and checks they carried out after the casualty which exonerated them fully from any responsibility for the loss.

That is of course unless they have some plan to blame the crew for causing the loss of stability by loading their stores incorrectly or some such excuse.

Apologies for not replying sooner .. would i have encounterd a wrath of opinions if i said .. her ending was simply down to her being top heavy .. and with her having such a shallow draft added to the problem and her end .

Her design was flawed and even you believe that the vessel stability has been called into question and in all fairness she is more suited to be a inshore cruiser than a vessel you could rely on when the going get's tough even then the sea condtions captured on film was medicore .

I remember, long ago (long 10 years +) some vintage super yacht blew in a window , flooded , became unstable real quick and sank. A real bad Med storm. To help anybody remember, they had to cut a real big 30 something fast tender loose during the storm. The captain, also rotor wing pilot, could not fly off with only a part of the crew, guest and owner, pushed the helo over, and was rescued by coasties helo. All were safe but it was some famous, vintage yacht lost real fast.
There were some negative comments about the owner also.

I bring this up because I remember, a window blew in and she sank so fast. She made not had had all this modern certifications but was (I guess) classed somewhere.

Anybody remember?

It was M/Y Nadine, sank between Rome and Puerto Cervo.

That was her. Good memory.
Next question? Was she of class, flag, or inspection quality of any high value?
I'm just learning more about all this fancy flag stuff here.
AND,, Yes, it is speculation, but of personal interest, If Nadine had all of these or any fancy certifications, it could explain a little more to me. We know then a window failed under Nadine and maybe (maybe) maybe similar circumstances here. It may have been a good storm with some rouge waves at the wrong time, that threatened Yogi, maybe.
Only a few folks here liked the idea of hitting an unseen object (more speculation yes) so I'm interested in other ideas, including sound speculation.

Hi,

You might want to carefully re read what I wrote, I used a small two letter word at the start which should indicate that I am not saying this is the factual cause merely suggesting that as the shipyard have already previously as shown here http://www.yachtforums.com/forums/g...eryacht-yogi-sinks-13.html#post147687absolved themselves of any errors in the design and or execution of the construction it seems like a strange statement to make.

Stability Books are worked out on a variety of data and it is not unknown but it is uncommon for them to have errors in them, should this prove to be the case then I would suggest others on yachts from the same yard had theirs re examined.

One thing I have not seen anywhere is any sort of class restriction on where and what max sea conditions she could sail in, as she has been to Caribbean and back I would think that no such notation exists for her.

In looking at the pictures in post 1 of this thread I seem to think some damage is visible below the waterline. Perhaps it is an optical illusion?

The Class notation for Yogi is(was) ABS +A1,Commercial Yachting Service, +AMS and was certificated for unrestricted navigation. It was built to go anywhere without limitation or restriction.

The Safe Manning Certificate limited service to within 150 miles of a safe haven. This is a statutory limitation, not a classification limit.

I can't understand why there is so much concern about stability, the ship stayed afloat and more or less upright for 7 hours before it finally sank from progressive flooding of 8 watertight compartments.

The objective of design for damaged stability is to provide enough time for the passengers and crew to evacuate before the ship capsizes in a progressive flooding situation. For cargo ships (which yachts are) the target is 10 minutes. I think Yogi more than satisfied that part of its design.

For any damaged stability program to be of any use at all, the conditions specified in the stability book must be met. First and foremost, this means all the watertight doors and openings must be secured. This is the area people should be asking questions about.

Flag is doing the yachting industry a tremendous disservice by not informing owners, crew, and managers of the circumstances surrounding the loss of Yogi. This would never be accepted in the aviation industry but for some reason Flag is making the statement that those who serve as crew or pay for a berth on a superyacht are not entitled to the same protection as a tourist on a sightseeing helicopter or a flight to Miami.

I would think that the charter brokerage community would be up in arms. They place very wealthy clients on yachts like Yogi. Those are the clients who have enough influence to destroy this industry (and the broker) when another Yogi takes a few of their heirs down with it.

Flag has an obligation to inform everyone who might be exposed to the same risks that sank Yogi. We don't just want to know, we need to know what happened that night.

Because the "undermanning" line quite died out.

And yep, from the look of the records, it was just as stable as any of the best practices in spontaneous boat sinking.

That's actually some good advise, and noted... not just a pretty face hey Marmot .

Say the hose did come off the "riser" (I think someone stated earlier), how easy is it to get a situation like that under control...? Are we talking seconds, minutes, up to an hour, plus...?

Also, I haven't done a tank test as such, would they (Nav Arch/builder) check a boat with extra ballast (flooding situation), including the large windows close (closer) to the waterline (DWL)?

Is there also a point in which a boat is to far gone, and the boat becomes a danger/hazard, so there's the option of opening valves and watertight doors to make her go down...? Cheers

Far

If you mean the flexible exhaust connection, that device is located a few inches above the easily accessible isolation valve. It would have taken only moments for a crewmember to shut that valve.

There may well have been an exhaust problem but I believe we will find that (if and when the truth is ever revealed) that those problems were secondary to or a result of other operational failings.

Only if the self destruct charges fail to detonate. The difficult part of that process is convincing a junior crewmember to remain onboard to open the scuttling valves in case the charges don't sink the boat.

Haven't you ever seen the big red button on the wheelhouse console that says "Push to Arm - Release to Detonate" ?

it would be nice if we new the real facts about the sinking

travler

Is it possible that there was no one in the E/R as well...? So from the time of the captain looking at the port side engine (port engine?) dash light up like a christmas tree - then accessing the TV screen to see what the F@#k was happening - then for someone to physically check - then take in what was going on and finally act on it... a bit of time there...?

Im in a state of slight equilibrium... I'm not to sure whether your taking the piss or not...

A mate of mine has been in a situation in a yacht race where he (and crew) knew the boat was going down, they got to a safe zone - away from the fleet and closer to shore, got the liferafts inflated and ready... then opened up the valves - 90degs down bubble for the boat.

Far

Hi,

I am yet to see a yacht with valves purposely fitted to be used for scuttling the vessel.

No matter what falls of within the vessel there should be a valve located on the ships side to shut off the water flow to that pipe, the exception of course being the stubs where the Inlet and Outlet valves are actually attached to the hull.

If one of those breaks off the task of stopping the leak becomes exponentially more difficult but not all together impossible.

I guess I should have put a smiley after my last paragraph. As I think your sailiing buddy should have as well.

Even if no one got to the engine room a half hour after the failure of an exhaust flex there is no way it would sink the boat. The exhaust issue is a red herring. There are several reasons that boat sank but the loss of an exhaust connection is not the major one of them. If an exhaust connection failed it failed because of other decisions and operational factors, not material defect or poor design.

The way that boat flooded and the condition it was in just before it finally sank indicates progressive flooding from aftermost compartments. I will stick my neck out and say that I believe a hatch or port failed or was not secured, no one knew about it because they were all sicker than dogs from trying to maintain full speed in conditions that a "prudent mariner' would have reduced speed and changed heading. Steering was lost, an engine was lost because the boat rolled so far for so long that the sea chest vents could not keep up with air intrusion and when the first engine failed there was finally no steering available.

I will go even further and state that it appears there was no crew coordination or leadership. I question crew familiarity with the vessel, knowledge of damage control, and the judgement of the master in placing the vessel and crew in a situation that could have and should have been avoided.

I am amazed that the charter side of the superyacht business is not demanding information about the reasons behind this mess. There could well have been a dozen innocent and very wealthy individuals involved in what could have easily turned into a tragedy. The lawsuits and damage to this industry would knock it further down than the world economy already has. The silence is as sickening as it is deafening.

The first time the child of an UHNW individual is lost because of the same reasons Yogi was lost will be a bad day for flag, class, and everyone with a stake in the yacht industry.

Have to agree with Marmot on likely flooding events. My large yacht blue water experience, although possibly limited in comparison to others on YF, is enough to say dangerous weather can be avoided given the surfeit of forecasting available. Placing the vessel in harms way seems the initiating event. If this is the case, were "executive" shore orders given to proceed even though weather was worse than unfavorable