El Faro B-Roll Release

NTSB releases additional video documentation on last year's efforts to locate and recover the El Faro voyage data recorder.

[@hlgthewall94]

When an off duty engineer asks the captain "What's our downflooding angle?" And the captain says "I don't know" You might as well go ahead and jump overboard

[@GregDV]

What has shocked me was the amount of times the Captain discounted the concerns of other bridge personnel about the hurricane. As a Captain for a fortune 500 company if my first officer has a concern about the route I picked to get through an area of weather I will take their input and look at what they think then we will take the most conservative route whether it was my route or his, extra fuel and time be damned. Taking the route through the old Bahama channel like some of those on the bridge suggested would probably have been a better route in hindsight, I cant understand why the Captain was hell bent on staying with the original coarse. And being a Navy, vet corrosion control was a constant battle onboard ship.

[@SI-gs5rj]

Fixed mindset of the Captain responding to pressure from corporate to conserve fuel and arrive on time; confirmation bias in looking at his own weather feed that was over two hours old and did not pick up the change in the storm track; no excuse. You need to be open to well-informed ideas and suggestions from your team. He only saw the information he needed to support his own decisions. Ignored all else. Complacency kills

[@Brodie--lw6eb]

The guy was looking for command of one of the newer vessels and didn’t want a late arrival hurting his chances. Want to know what hurts those chances even more? Being dead. He also prevented the rest of his crew from ever eating another meal, seeing their families again, etc. Absolute irresponsibility. If there was ever a case for mutiny it was this one. It’s too bad the rest of the officers were more professional than the clown captain. I know I know, shouldn’t speak ill of the dead. I think it’s warranted here, he abandoned his first priority and that was the safety/security of his ship and crew.

[@zakelwe]

@@Brodie--lw6eb I'm not convinced about the new vessel argument the NTSB put forward as it is known that the captain was thinking of going the different route for the way back which would have delayed them that time.

[@zakelwe]

Interestingly the sister ship sailed the same route in the opposite direction and could have also been in trouble apart from the rather unusual path that hurricane took. Small differences can make a largely different outcome.

[@100SteveB]

Fantastic job recovering the recorder after so many months. RIP to all those that lost their lives, but damn the Captain that sent them all to the bottom by his negligent/criminal behaviour. So glad that the recorder was recovered so that the truth was discovered - or at least part of it. From what i have read elsewhere it would seem that the ship was very poorly maintained by her owners - money before safety per usual.

[@popacap21]

God rest their souls

[@destry5250]

I'm surprised the Polish maintenance crew didn't pick up long handle tools and take over the bridge . . .

[@kevinfromsales6842]

🤣

[@Pugetwitch]

they were largely unaware, and were not familiar with hurricane storm systems.

[@nonovyerbusiness9517]

Very interesting. Are the shipboard mounts for these recorders designed to have them break free during a sinking? To keep them clear of possible tangled wreckage?

[@pepelimabarr]

Nonov Yerbusiness no, they are supposed to go down with the sinking vesseñ

[@AirplaneDetective]

New rules now say that ships must also have a float free capsule in addition to the regular VDR

[@brandonlindo9247]

AirplaneDetective I was thinking the exact same thing. I thought that the VDR was much like the EPIRB to where it’s design to float free in instances such as these. If nothing else then to indicate the last known position as well as other relative shipboard info

[@handsome-brute2666]

Basically this was a true life Perfect Storm like the 🎥 movie..the imagine of Mark Walberg floating in the vast hurricane ocean would be exactly how they perished

[@sergeant1446]

Perfect Storm was based on a real event. There's a documentary on the FV Andrea Gail.

[@mitchwood6609]

In the final minutes of the recording, Davidson pleads with a sailor to move. “We gotta move. You gotta get up. You gotta snap out of it and we gotta get out,” he says. “Okay,” the sailor answers. “Help me.” “You gotta get to safety,” Davidson shouts. “Help me,” the sailor cries. “Help me.” “Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Work your way up here,” the captain says. He refuses to leave. “I can’t. I’m a goner.” “It's time to come this way,” Davidson shouts. Then the recording stops.

[@kita1989]

Where did you hear the transcripts or read them?

[@mitchwood6609]

@@kita1989 i cant recall now but you can find them if you google it and dig deep enough

[@Pugetwitch]

”On the bridge, the Captain greeted First Mate Randolph’s replacement while she went to her quarters, chief mate Steve Shultz, along with a new helmsman, Frank Hamm. He set out to calm their nerves. “There’s nothing bad about this ride,” the captain announced, despite the hurricane raging outside. “I was sleepin’ like a baby. This is every day in Alaska,” the captain continued. No one could see out of the windows, except for when brief sparks of lightning illuminated the rain. “A typical winter day in Alaska.” ... With the ship tilting and oil pressure decreasing, the captain decided to use the wind to force the ship more upright. If he could do that, he could get oil pressure back, and increase the ship’s power. “Just steer that heading right there the best you can. That’ll work for us,” the captain instructed Hamm and Shultz. The ship dropped down a three-story-tall swell. “Feel the pressure droppin’ in your ears just then? Feel that?” Davidson said, trying to make light of the situation. Hamm’s large frame was bent over in fear at his console. Two days earlier, the 49-year-old father of five had called Rochelle, his wife, just before he sailed out of range. He said everything was OK - Hamm liked and trusted the captain, with whom he’d often worked. But in the chaos of the storm, he had been unable to send his customary daily email home. “Take your time and relax,” Davidson said. Hamm managed to find his breath, then took the helm back. “I am relaxed, Captain.” An engineer from below deck appeared on the bridge. Something wasn’t right. “I’ve never seen it list like this,” the engineer reported. The El Faro’s steep list was not just from sliding shipping containers, the engineer reasoned - something else was to blame. The phone rang with a call from the engine room. The ship was losing oil pressure, and needed to be righted now. I’m tryin’ to get her steadied up,” the captain replied. Water surged over the ship’s stern, and the sound of the ocean pounding the old ship was deafening. Another electric ring of the telephone. Davidson answered, “Bridge, captain.” A moment passed and he turned to his chief mate: “We got a prrroooblem.”

[@Pugetwitch]

"Water had started flooding one of the ship’s warehouse-sized holds used to store cars and other large containers. He ordered Shultz, a 54-year-old former Navy captain and seasoned mariner, below deck immediately to start pumping out the hold. It was a perilous assignment. Any piece of heavy cargo afloat in the hold could easily pulverize Shultz. The chief mate grabbed a walkie-talkie and climbed down from the bridge. The captain took the ship’s helm from Hamm. With water flooding into the El Faro’s insides, he knew why he’d been unable to right the ship. He turned the steering wheel hard, trying to use the wind again - anything to decrease the ship’s angle. Shultz radioed from down below, in the flooded cargo chamber. At 6 a.m., Randolph came back to the bridge from her stateroom. She’d changed out of her work clothes, and hadn’t changed back before coming up. She moved over to the dead radar screen - it’d gone dark, maybe from water coming through a gap in one of the bridge’s windows - to try and get the ship’s current position. After a few minutes, the radar fluttered and suddenly blinked back to life. “All right, good,” the captain said. He ordered Randolph to sync the latest BVS weather models with their current position, still not realizing the data was hours old, and useless. Randolph wasn’t supposed to be on the bridge, but Davidson didn’t question her. “You want me to stay with you?” Randolph asked. “Please,” the captain said. “It’s just the ...” He couldn’t finish his sentence."

[@Pugetwitch]

"Shultz called from the flooded hold again. He wanted the bridge to move the ship so the water below would shift to the other side. All at once, a terrifying silence gripped them. The rumble and vibration of ship’s engines ceased. The El Faro was adrift. “I think we just lost the plant,” Davidson said. Somehow, he needed to balance the ship - an almost impossible feat without propulsion. Down below, the whirring pumps continued to push thousands of gallons a minute from the flooded holds. Up top, everyone had to use their leg muscles to stay standing on the angling ship. “Feeling those thighs burn?” Randolph asked Hamm, as he dug in to turn the rudder. Just after 7 a.m., Davidson picked up the ship’s emergency satellite phone. He dialed the cellphone number of TOTE’s designated person ashore, the only human in charge of knowing what was going on with the fleet. The call went to voicemail. Davidson rattled out a brief message, then called the company’s answering service. A woman picked up with a pleasant hello. “We had a hull breach; a scuttle blew open during a storm,” Davidson explained tersely. “We have water down in three hold, with a heavy list. We’ve lost the main propulsion unit, the engineers cannot get it going.” He asked for her to patch him through to a TOTE official immediately. “Can you please give me your satellite phone number and spell the name of the vessel?” she asked slowly. “Spell your name, please?” TOTE safety officials had identified the answering service as a problem previously, but it had not been fixed. “The clock is ticking” the captain said, his voice calm despite the chaos. He tried again. “This is a marine emergency, and I am tryin’ to also notify management!” He gave the operator his name and number and hung up."

[@normajeanmorrissey2903]

Just like Titanic. It wasn't just the iceberg.There were other things very wrong. I have read many things about Titanic. I only recently read about El Faro (lighthouse in Spanish) My observations are first ship was 40 years old and crew called it a "rust bucket" with holes in the deck. Should I believe the hull was in tenuous condition? Poor hull condition, perhaps loose cargo hold hatches, did she take on too much water, making her list. Especially with very rough seas from hurricane. Captain was cautioned by crew about real concerns. He didn't seem overly concerned at first. Did he feel so sure of his "captain's" ability to man the ship that he ignored concerns of crew? Even with recovery of DVR and taped Bridge talk, we will never know. Captains of Titanic, El Faro also Edmund Fitzgerald 🔔took all their secrets to a watery grave. My thought is that these men all very much in charge were guilty of hubris. They felt they could do no wrong. They were always right with their decisions. Again we will never know. May our Heavenly Father bless all souls lost at sea and those loved ones left behind. 👼🌟Norma Jean Morrissey history lover

[@handsome-brute2666]

And hubris will get u to early grave every time💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀

[@themysterypooper9230]

Does a ship in that condition mean that it was hit like that when the waves were hitting? Or is that when it hit the bottom of the ocean?

[@shable1436]

Both

[@wesleybrutcher8956]

Everything leading up to this was blind confidence in a sub standard ship run by a untrained captain and crew to make tote’s more money . My hope is that as of 6/22 the families of the lost have been Well Compensated and ships under similar classes are better inspected by owners and crew everywhere . God bless all at sea .

[@dickfitswell3437]

Those poor men died because what basically boils down to one thing. Greed. Then that trickles down to vessel quality, Captains ability to take criticism or take recommendations from junior vessel officers. Overall it is greed. That vessel was too old. Ive been on several vessels that were covered, covered in rust that instead of doing rust busting, they would hide it with paint. When I say hide it, I mean figuratively and literally. I peeled thick paint off of one and below the super thick paint was some of the worst rust I've ever seen. It was a hand rail. And with the paint removed you could see it covered a hole that rusted below the surface while no one could even see. So. How much of the rest of the vessel had those issues. Who knows. But luckily I was only going onboard at anchorage.(anchorage is a point off the coast. Usually near a major port). Galveston has the Port of Texas City, the Port of Houston and The Port of Galveston as well as a few smaller ports that utilize the anchorage called Houston Anchorage thats a few miles off the coast. I would have never rode those vessels any point past being unable to see land. No way. My dad was a merchant marine and when they were in rough seas he watched their sister ship go over the crest of a 50ft wave and split in half. All were lost. Vessels are made to flex. Not to split. There was likely issues with the structure. I would bet on rust being a main issue.

[@petahoee8281]

YES!!! And the NTBS is also greedy and dirty.

[@zachthomas7810]

@@petahoee8281 bro how. You type of people just like pointing to the sky and yelling

[@someguy9778]

He lost his sister in this sinking. He has every right to.

[@petahoee8281]

All the board members of the NTSB will rot in hell if not prison. This was a cover up. My sister emailed my mom everything about the countless times she went up to the captain and told him to change course. About all the shoty work they did to cover up the all the rust and floors caving in. The ABS is dirty all they care about is fuel saved.

[@kevinfromsales6842]

I'm sorry to hear that your sister was on that ship. I watched a well put together documentary on this tragedy recently and those emails were mentioned in it if I remember correctly. At least the truth is out there now.

[@shable1436]

Daniel was trying with all her power to alter course, and yes Davidson will go down as a scoundrel to the tote elites dick rider, we all know she was out ranked by captain narcissist. Her brothers are Nick and Randy though and it's not cool to pretend to be family if you're not

[@tird108]

THAT WAS YOUR SISTER DAMN!

[@PlateletRichGel]

Let me ask you something. If you lived in Puerto Rico, would you buy the lettuce and vegetables carried by the more expensive ship and with the higher standards, for $3.99 or the lettuce brought inSo by a rust bucket like the El Faro for $2.49. I hear all these people talking about buy American, yet they never bought their tools at Sears American made, but Harbor Freight chinese cheapo tools. So blame yourselves for globalization.