Washington State Ferries (WSF) has released the findings of its investigation into the July 28, 2022, incident in which its 328 foot long ferry M/V Cathlamet struck one of the mooring dolphins at the Fauntleroy Ferry Terminal near Seattle.
Washington State Ferries, which described the ferry strike as “a hard landing” at the time, immediately launched an internal investigation that is now complete. Separate Coast Guard and National Transportation Safety Board investigations remain ongoing.
“Our investigation found that human error and a failure to follow existing procedures led to the incident,” says WSF. “The captain resigned the next day and has not provided an explanation as to what happened. We sent a safety notice reinforcing landing procedures immediately following the event. As a result of the internal investigation, additional policies and training are under development. In addition, ‘black box’ data recorders have been installed aboard Cathlamet and will become standard equipment on all our vessels. We remain in constant contact with federal investigators and we may administer further changes based on Coast Guard recommendations.”
Here’s what the report recommends on those “black boxes” (voyage data recorders).
- “All vessels should have Voyage Data Recorders (VDR) installed. This eliminates the confusion of what everyone thinks happened during an emergency. With a robust VDR system, any incident will have an evidentiary level of information on what was said by whom, what the plant was doing at the time, what navigational commands were given and when. The current data logger system is useful for troubleshooting machinery equipment status and/or failures only.”
As we reported earlier, the Cathlamet has now been returned to Washington State Ferries after a coordinated repair effort by sister shipyards Everett Ship Repair and Nichols Brothers Boat Builders.
Download the investigation report
