Flashback in maritime history – EL FARO sinking and the loss of 33 people on 1 Oct 2015 (video)

EL FARO was a United States-flagged, combination roll-on/roll-off and lift-on/lift-off cargo ship crewed by U.S. merchant mariners. She was lost at sea with all hands on October 1, 2015, after losing propulsion near the eyewall of Hurricane Joaquin.

El Faro departed Jacksonville, Florida, bound for Puerto Rico at 8:10 pm EST on September 29, 2015, when then-Tropical Storm Joaquin was several hundred miles to the east. Two days later, after Joaquin had become a Category 3 hurricane, the vessel likely encountered swells of 20 to 40 ft (6 to 12 m) and winds over 80 kn (150 km/h; 92 mph) as it sailed near the storm’s eye. Around 7:30 a.m. on October 1, the ship had taken on water and was listing 15 degrees. The last report from the captain, however, indicated that the crew had contained the flooding. Shortly thereafter, El Faro ceased all communications with shore.

On October 2, the 40-year-old ship was declared missing, and an extensive search operation was launched by the United States Coast Guard, with help from the Air Force, Air National Guard, and Navy. They recovered debris and a damaged lifeboat, and spotted (but could not recover) an unidentifiable body. El Faro was declared sunk on October 5. The search was called off at sunset on October 7, by which time more than 183,000 sq nmi had been covered by aircraft and ships. The Navy sent the USNS Apache to conduct an underwater search for El Faro on October 19, 2015. The Apache identified a vessel on October 31 “consistent with [the El Faro] cargo ship…in an upright position and in one piece.” The next day, November 1, the Navy announced a submersible had returned images that identified the wreck as the El Faro.

The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) issued a news release which identified various leading causal factors including:

the captain’s navigation decisions;

inaccurate weather information;

poor bridge team management;

lack of oversight by the owner;

inadequate damage control plans; and

carriage of obsolete open lifeboats.

The deadliest shipping disaster involving a U.S.-flagged vessel in more than 30 years was caused by a captain’s failure to avoid sailing into a hurricane despite numerous opportunities to route a course away from hazardous weather, the National Transportation Safety Board announced during a public meeting.

The 790-foot, cargo vessel, S.S. El Faro, en route from Jacksonville, Florida, to San Juan, Puerto Rico, sank Oct. 1, 2015, in the Atlantic Ocean during Hurricane Joaquin, taking the lives of all 33 aboard.

“We may never understand why the captain failed to heed his crew’s concerns about sailing into the path of a hurricane, or why he refused to chart a safer course away from such dangerous weather,” said NTSB Chairman Robert L. Sumwalt. “But we know all too well the devastating consequences of those decisions.”

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