Germany’s Federal Bureau for Maritime Casualty Investigation (BSU) has published its Annual Report for 2023, providing useful insights on marine casualties.
The total number of notifications has risen sharply year-on-year: 698 in 2023 compared to 659 in 2022. This represents an increase of almost 6%. In the case of marine casualties according to the IMO Code, there was a significant increase of more than 10% (120 to 134) and in the case of incidents, a slight reduction (294 to 273).
However, the increase in global reporting is mainly due to the rise in the number of OCIs reported, i.e., cases for which the BSU is not responsible or that do not constitute an accident (237 to 291). The total number of actual accidents has remained almost identical: 414 in the previous year to 407 in 2023.
Marine casualties
There were changes here compared to the previous year. LSMCs have increased from 92 to 109 cases, SMCs have dropped from 26 to 22 cases and VSMCs have increased from two to three cases.
Collisions, allisions and accidents involving people were once more the most common kinds of accident in 2023. In the case of serious marine casualties, engine damage leads the way. Allisions are in second place.
The accident causes attributable to human error in 2023 were once more predominantly ‘Error in judgement’ and ‘Simple navigational error’. Accidents due to a lack of occupational safety are also extremely common again, in most cases ‘only’ resulting in injury, but in one case with fatal consequences. Moreover, fatalities due to non-compliance with health and safety regulations are a regular occurrence every year.
Breakdowns of the main engine or of the rudder, blackouts or misfires (108 cases or 40% of all incidents) are the predominant causes. The ratio between the human and the technical causes is almost one to two for incidents (153 to 90). However, added to this are the ‘Other’ causes (especially bad weather, swell).
