An electric arc has been identified by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) as the cause of a fire in the engine room aboard a fishing vessel – a blaze that put the crew’s lives at risk when they were unable to extinguish it. The four crew members of the Rose Marie, a 77-foot trawler 65 miles off the coast of Chatham, Massachusetts, abandoned ship and got into a life raft.

Two years after a devastating collision in Singapore that claimed the lives of ten U.S. Navy sailors and injured 48 more, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has determined that a lack of training was a key factor in the August 21, 2017 tragedy. Inadequate bridge operating procedures and a lack of operational oversight also contributed to the incident involving the USS John S. McCain, a destroyer, and the Liberian-flagged Alnic MC, a chemical tanker.

Flooding in a tank that held clams caused a fishing vessel to capsize and sink off the coast of Massachusetts, according to an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Two crew members were trapped on board and died when the uninspected fishing vessel Misty Blue sank on December 4, 2017.

A towing vessel crew’s inability to close windows and doors when a fire began in the engine room nearly cost them their lives, according to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), which investigated the incident.

When fire erupted on a passenger vessel cruising Florida’s Pithlachascotee River earlier this year, all aboard had to jump from the burning vessel and wade – or crawl - ashore. One person died and 14 others were transported to area hospitals. The Island Lady was so badly damaged it was declared a total loss.

From watertight integrity to managing fatigue, the information gleaned from investigations into 41 maritime accidents are now available in one digest intended to provide mariners with information that will help make their operations safer. The National Transportation Safety Board’s Safer Seas Digest 2017, released online yesterday, contains detailed accident investigation reports for collisions, explosions, capsizings and allisions involving fishing, offshore supply, cargo, passenger, tanker, towing and government vessels.

A too-large catch was behind the sinking of a commercial fishing vessel last year off the coast of Virginia, according to a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) report. There were no injuries or fatalities among the crew, but the five people on board the Langley Douglas had to be rescued by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter.

A shrimp boat captain’s decision to continue a journey even though his ship had a hole in the hull was what caused the demise of Lady Damaris, a trawler that sank in the Gulf of Mexico in 2017. That determination by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) was based on an investigation into the June 22 incident, which fortunately did not result in any injuries or fatalities.

An equipment failure led to a Sept. 6, 2016 incident in the Houston Ship Channel that left two marine pilots with burns and discharged 88,000 gallons of low-sulfur marine gas oil – which subsequently caught on fire. That’s the finding of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). The agency’s investigation into the incident found that a momentary failure of a ship’s governor actuator system caused the tank vessel Aframax River to violently strike two mooring “dolphins” - man-made marine structures extending above the water level.

The deadliest shipping disaster involving a U.S.-flagged vessel in more than 30 years was caused by a captain’s failure to avoid sailing into a hurricane despite numerous opportunities to route a course away from hazardous weather, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) announced during a public meeting Tuesday. The cargo vessel S.S. El Faro sank Oct. 1, 2015, in the Atlantic Ocean during Hurricane Joaquin, taking the lives of all 33 aboard.