What Is Included In The Term Emergency?

What's included in the term 'Emergency'? Various emergencies can occur onboard yachts, such as fire, collision, grounding, foundering or sinking, man overboard (MOB), ingress of water, heavy weather, oil spill and more. If an emergency occurs on board, there are several shipboard contingency plans available for the crew to use. Which one to use depends on the nature of the crisis. The contingency plan assists the crew by knowing what to prepare and ensuring nothing is forgotten in an emergency. The following contingency plans can be found onboard:

1. Fire & Safety Plan, 
2. Emergency Plan, 
3. General Arrangement Plan, 
4. Man Over Board Instructions, & 
5. Oil Pollution Emergency Plan.

We will now take a closer look at each one. 

Fire and Safety Plan

The fire and safety plan illustrates the location, number and type of all fire & safety equipment found onboard:

• Fire stations and control stations.
• Fire-fighting appliances.
• Portable fire extinguishers.
• Manual Call Points (fire alarms).
• Fire dampers.
• Muster stations.
• Lifeboats and liferafts.
• Lifebuoys.
• Survival suits, PPE, etc.
• On older vessels, the Fire & Safety Plan may be divided into two plans, a Fire Control Plan and a Safety Plan.

Emergency Plan

On the vessel’s emergency plan, the following information can be found:

• Location of muster stations.
• Description and illustrations of alarm signals.
• General lifeboat/liferaft instruction.
• General fire instruction.
• Channels for emergency communication.
• Assignments for fire alarm and abandon ship alarm.
• Allocation of lifeboats and liferafts.
• Responsible person for maintenance of Life Saving Appliances and Fire Fighting Equipment.

General Arrangement Plan

The general arrangement plan, also known as the GA plan, illustrates the yacht’s structure:

• Decks.
• Masts.
• Tanks.
• Compartments.
• Location of cranes.
• Location of mooring equipment.

Man Overboard (MOB) Instructions

• Description of MOB alarm.
• What to do when witnessing a person falling overboard.
• Procedure to return to the MOB location (if known).
• Individual assignments for all personnel onboard.
• Who & how to notify the crew.

Oil Pollution Emergency Plan

• Description of oil pollution alarm
• Location of oil pollution equipment
• Individual assignments for all personnel onboard
• When, what and who to notify.

Drills and Muster

To avoid chaos and to ensure a degree of efficiency, it is necessary that everyone onboard already possesses a thorough knowledge of what needs to be done in the case of an emergency – where to go and what to bring. These emergency instructions are given via the vessel’s muster lists, which are placed so that everyone onboard can easily read them, they are usually found onboard yachts in the crew mess. 

The muster list contains information about specific duties allocated to each individual crew member and the division of crew in various squads and teams. This list also has the location of muster stations and information about emergency control stations, radio communication, etc. 

On hearing an emergency alarm signal or discovering potential emergencies,  you have to take action! Dress suitably and appropriately, go to the muster station, find out the nature of the emergency and take action as per the muster list/duty list or captains orders.

Value of and Need for Drills and Training

Drills and training are needed because of several reasons. There are regulatory & legislative needs, i.e. requirements of SOLAS, MARPOL, STCW, ISM, etc. There is also an operational need – to ensure correct and effective action in an emergency. Regular and realistic drills are the only way to achieve that.

Training is needed to set a state of mind amongst the crew. On exposure to an emergency, all persons are affected and there is a general dip or reduction in performance. This dip in performance can only be compensated by regular and realistic drills.

Alarm System

There are different kinds of alarm systems on board vessels, such as the ship general alarm, fire alarm and ship's whistle. The ship general alarm and fire alarm system consist of bells and flashing lights, depending on where they are installed. The systems mentioned above are often interconnected by an alarm panel, which means that if there is a fire alarm, the alarm will be sounding and the lights will flash on the bridge alarm panel, the vessel's whistle may also be activated. 

It is important to note that onboard yachts the vessel's whistle, especially when there are guests on board is omitted/delayed. The vessel's whistle is set to sound after a certain amount of time (seconds up to few minutes) if an alarm is not acknowledged on the Bridge. 

Alarm signals normally give the first warning and indicate the type of situation in question – both in an actual emergency and for drills. It is, therefore, vital to know the meaning of the various alarm signals. The main alarm known as the general alarm is seven short blasts followed by one long given on the ship's whistle ( . . . . . . . _____). The abandoning ship alarm sounds the same as the main alarm. The fire alarm is continuous sounding for at least 10 seconds using the vessel's whistle. If a man falls overboard, the alarm sounded is three long blasts (Morse Oscar 'O') sounded using the whistle.

Although the above-mentioned alarms are normally used onboard all types of ships. These may vary on yachts especially when the owner or guests are onboard. These are usually substituted by Code words or messages which will indicate the emergency instead of the alarms. Doing this avoids disturbing the guests or panicking them. Having said that, it is extremely important to provide guests and owners with all the information in order to ensure that they follow the orders of the crew in the case of an emergency. 

Internal Communication

There are various internal communications in use onboard yachts – especially for emergencies.

Telephone

Depending on the age of the yacht, the telephone system can range from basic to sophisticated. This is the standard way of internal communication onboard. The vessel's electrical system powers the telephone system and telephones can be anywhere on a vessel.

Emergency Powered or Sound-Powered Phone

Emergency powered or sound-powered phones facilitate internal communication in case of power loss. The phones are mainly located on the navigation bridge, the engine control room and the steering gear room/propulsion room.

Public Address Systems (PA Systems)

PA system facilitates mass notification onboard. The PA system control stations are mainly located on the navigation bridge. However, the modern telephone system allows you to make a public announcement using any telephone onboard.

Lifeboat VHF

The lifeboat VHF could be either a fixed installed VHF radio or a portable VHF radio. The radio works on the VHF band, where channel 16 is the designated channel for communication in an emergency. The portable VHF radios are generally stowed on the bridge, but depending on the type of vessel they can be stowed at any other location.

Walkie-talkie

A hand-held, robust and easy to use two-way radio transceiver. Used for communication between the crew. 

Emergency Escape Routes

Onboard a yacht, there are a number of emergency escape routes. The routes are marked in the safety plan, and all personnel must familiarize themselves with the routes immediately after joining the ship. The routes' location depends on the structure of the vessel, but in general, the routes intend to guide persons away from the danger. Probable locations of the emergency escape routes are:

• From the engine room.
• From steering gear/propulsion room.
• From the accommodation/cabin area.
• From helicopter deck.