Two ships in distress west of Norway

[Urwumpe]

Its now two ships in distress, both with failed engines during bad sea state west of Norway, near the coast in the dangerous waters around Kristiansund.



First, the Viking Sky declared an emergency when its engine failed. Its a cruise ship with 1300 passengers, they already started to evacuate the passengers by helicopter.



Then, a few hours later, the Hagland Captain also suffered an engine failure while trying to help the Viking Sky. The coast guard now diverted two helicopters to the Hagland Captain to rescue the crew of the freighter.



The westerly winds are currently causing huge waves there.


https://www.ksta.de/panorama/vor-no...schiff-nun-weiteres-schiff-in-seenot-32267578




[ame="https://twitter.com/alexus309/status/1109537029912711168"]Alexus Sheppard ?️‍? on Twitter: "Still waiting for evacuation. #VikingSky #Mayday… "[/ame]

 

[Notebook]

On the news now, looks bad.

N.

 

[C3PO]

How did they manage that? All cruise ships I've seen had at least one layer of redundancy, most had triple or more. One even had two completely separate engine rooms (mirrored).

 

[Urwumpe]

How did they manage that? All cruise ships I've seen had at least one layer of redundancy, most had triple or more. One even had two completely separate engine rooms (mirrored).

No idea, but considering the extreme waves in that region, I would not be surprised if a water hammer damaged multiple engines at once.


There is an article about how to prevent damage from a water hammer entering the sea chest, its not too easy.



http://bulkcarrierguide.com/ballast-handling-preventing-water-hammer-surging.html

Also note that both ships had been new and designed especially for Norwegian waters. Its an extreme sea state there, as you can see in the helicopter videos.

 

[fred18]

the bad news for the passengers is that engines out means also taking out many systems that help to stabilize the ship, the first of all is the possibility to steer the ship towards the waves instead of just float transversed with them...

Relevant to how did that happen I'm not surprised for the freighter since the redundancy there is almost 0, but a bit surprised about the passenger ship. even thought the sea state is probably playing an important role there: with that kind of sea state it is possible that the ship got beyond some operational limits of the engines and everything stalled.

it seems from HERE that the ship's propulsion is diesel electric that should much more flexible also for this conditions, so that's strange anyway...

 

[Artlav]

Looking at a video, i'm a bit surprised how furniture is sliding around. Isn't it standard protocol on ships to have everything bolted down?

 

[C3PO]

No idea, but considering the extreme waves in that region, I would not be surprised if a water hammer damaged multiple engines at once.


There is an article about how to prevent damage from a water hammer entering the sea chest, its not too easy.



http://bulkcarrierguide.com/ballast-handling-preventing-water-hammer-surging.html

Also note that both ships had been new and designed especially for Norwegian waters. Its an extreme sea state there, as you can see in the helicopter videos.

I wish that I could find the NRK footage of the tanker I started my career on, sailing through that area. That video made me feel slightly sick when I saw it, and I was on board when it was filmed.

Looking at a video, i'm a bit surprised how furniture is sliding around. Isn't it standard protocol on ships to have everything bolted down?

No. Passenger ships have stabilization systems that are good enough to leave everything just like at home... when they work! :dry:

 

[Urwumpe]

They stopped the evacuation after 1/3rd of the passengers and are now attempting to drag the ship into the port of Molde. The ship and the tugs are now about 15 NM northwest of Gossa.

The Hagland Captain seems to be back under control (But its moving with just about 0.9 knots during the night). It is 1 NM north of Nordneset.

 

[fred18]

(But its moving with just about 0.9 knots during the night). It is 1 NM north of Nordneset.

Well even at 0.9 knots 1 NM is 1 hour, so they're almost home

 

[Urwumpe]

Well even at 0.9 knots 1 NM is 1 hour, so they're almost home

Weeeeeeell... unless 0.9 knots is also the speed of the surface current... :lol:

 

[boogabooga]

How did they manage that? All cruise ships I've seen had at least one layer of redundancy, most had triple or more. One even had two completely separate engine rooms (mirrored).

Bent shafts?

 

[Urwumpe]

Bent shafts?

I assumed it to have engine pods, but I was wrong after some industry research, it used this kind of combined propeller and rudder system:

https://www.rolls-royce.com/product...omas-propulsion-and-manoeuvring-system.aspx#/

Maybe the wave really managed to cause damage there, but that shouldn't be repairable outside dock.
Also the crew managed to get 3 out of four engines back online that made it possible to tow the ship back to port despite the poor conditions, so its likely a smaller kind of severe defect.
One witness report stated that a strong wave opened a locked watertight door. Maybe the force of the wave was also enough to cause flooding in the engine room.

 

[Urwumpe]

Ok, the cause was way more trivial. It had too low levels of lubricating oil and the strong waves made the oil pumps run dry. No idea why this takes so long to fix, maybe the strong waves made it impossible to pump enough oil into the engines to start them again.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...bhlcRPmAagg4pwQWCFhSO7Ct_NB7W4BgD_f-Vy_ZEfqkA