JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — El Faro should have been held in port on the day it left for its final voyage so surveyors could check if its lifeboats worked properly after recent repairs.
It was a major oversight revealed in the final day of the first round of the Marine Board of Investigation hearings.
Louis O’Donnell was the first witness of the day. He’s the assistant chief surveyor for ABS, a private company that also conducts surveys on commercial vessels.
He read aloud from a document detailing the repairs done to El Faro’s lifeboats.
“Service aboard El Faro to install two free wheel clutches in lifeboat winches,” said O’Donnell.
In other words, the clutches in the brakes were repaired, which has to do with the mechanism that lowers the boats to a position where crew can get in to abandon ship.
According to O’Donnell, ABS was not notified of the repairs as it's required. Had they been notified, O’Donnell said they would’ve held the ship in port.
“We would’ve asked the owners (to) have us come down to do a test to prove the repairs,” said O’Donnell.
TOTE Services’ port engineer overseeing those repairs that day, Tim Neeson, admitted it was an oversight on his part.
“I just forgot to notify ABS about it, no reason to hide it,” said Neeson.
The Coast Guard located at least one heavily damaged life boat in the early stages of the search for possible survivors.
Neeson said the oversight was not because of time constraints and said changing the clutches on the winches was voluntary because they had become “noisy.” Neeson said he was also concerned El Faro’s lifeboat davits could have some of the same deterioration he saw on its sister ship El Yunque.
According to Neeson, the technician who completed the repairs is certified by ABS and tested the lifeboats before leaving the vessel.
TOTE attorneys said El Faro had passed an annual safety inspection done a month before by the company that did the life boat repairs but ABS confirmed it wasn’t there for that inspection either.
Cox Media Group
