Report: Both vessels in purse seiner collision ignored int’l regulations

Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — A federal marine accident investigation has determined the “probable cause” of a collision last year between two US purse seiner vessels that were more than 1,000 miles northeast of American Samoa when the collision that caused an estimated damage of $8.3 million to both vessels, occurred.

Despite the damages, both vessels — MV American Eagle with 33 crew members on board and MV Koorale with a crew of 19 — were able to return to the Port of Pago Pago following the collision and no one was injured, according to US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) marine accident briefing report publicly released on Tuesday.

According to the report, it was after 5p.m on June 17, 2019 that both vessels were fishing in the eastern Pacific Ocean — 1,475 miles northwest of Pago Pago. While pursing the same school of tuna, the two vessels collided.

In its report, NTSB determined that the “probable cause of the collision” was that the captains and fishmasters of both vessels were “not following international collision regulations or communicating to make arrangements while pursuing the same school of fish.”

Working with the local US Coast Guard unit, the NTSB report provided details of the events leading up to and during the collision, and that includes interviews with crewmembers.

According to the analysis of the accident, both vessels were aware of each other’s locations in the moments leading up to the collision. Additionally, both vessels’ fishmasters believed their vessels were in position to set their nets and that, according to their “code group” rules, they each had first opportunity to do so.

(The report explained that captains and fishmasters of both vessels told investigators that members of their “code group” followed a set of unwritten rules, including a rule that whichever vessel was first to a school of fish and in position to set their nets had first opportunity to harvest.)

Regardless of the “code group” rules, the “international navigation rules should have guided their interaction,” according to NTSB, which points out that the two vessels “were in a crossing situation, and the American Eagle, having the Koorale on its starboard side, should have given way.

NTSB said the American Eagle did not alter course or speed to avoid the collision, and neither vessel took action until the last moments when the collision could not be avoided.

“As the two vessels raced to the same school [of tuna] and toward each other, no attempts were made to communicate,” the report said. “Both fishmasters cited the reason for this was their intense interaction with insults and yelling two days prior.”

Furthermore, neither captain stepped in to communicate because of the unofficial hierarchy on board the vessel, where the fishmasters directed the vessel while fishing.

“Both the American Eagle and Koorale saw each other and knew they were both competing for the same school of tuna. Had the captains and fishmasters followed the international collision regulations or communicated to make arrangements, a collision could have been avoided,” the report says.

As previously reported by Samoa News, the collusion resulted in legal actions taken by owners of the two vessels against each other, pending at the federal court in Tampa, Florida; and the courts in American Samoa New Zealand — where both vessels sailed to have repairs done. (See Samoa News edition Apr. 30th for the latest story on the battle in the courts.)