Opinion ID: 2959866
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Onboard the Kariba

Text: The Kariba is a 175.75 meters-long Bahamian flagged container ship, built in 1982, with a carrying capacity of about 1200 standard containers. Having left port in Antwerp, Belgium, the Kariba was bound for Le Havre, France, and travelling westward in the East-West Branch of the TSS. There were three men present on the bridge at the time of the collision: Captain Kamola, making his first restricted-visibility voyage as a Master; Second Officer Szymanski; and AbleBodied Seaman Ignacio. The bridge featured an Automatic Radar Plotting Aid (“ARPA”), described as a computer system that “automatically tracks and plots target vessels and calculates their courses and speeds,” thus predicting the “closest point of approach” of other vessels. Captain Kamola first noticed the Clary on his radar at 1:55 a.m. At 2:00 a.m., upon making a planned adjustment to his course by rounding a point called the Fairy South Buoy, 2 We include in an appendix to this opinion a depiction of the positions of the vessel in the moments leading up to the collision. 4 Captain Kamola noticed he might be headed for a collision with the Clary. Captain Kamola did not act, however, because he expected the Clary to steer astern of him. At 2:04 a.m., when his ARPA would have shown he was approximately 3.5 miles3 and eight minutes away from colliding with the Clary, Captain Kamola asked Syzmanski to go onto the port wing of the ship and to check for the Clary’s lights. After looking for approximately two minutes, Syzmanski did not see anything. At this point, the Kariba was 2.8 miles away from a collision with the Clary. By 2:09 a.m., Captain Kamola’s radar still indicated the Clary had not changed course. Concerned about a collision, and now only 2.0 miles away from a collision with the Clary, Captain Kamola ordered a 10 degree turn to starboard (registered on the Dunkerque radar at 2:09:45 a.m.). Fifteen or 20 seconds later, Captain Kamola ordered another 20 degree turn to starboard. Seconds later, Captain Kamola saw the lights of the Tricolor and ordered the rudder full to starboard. It was too late, however; Kamola exclaimed, “Oh my God, we will hit them.” Within the next minute or so, the Kariba’s bow struck the Tricolor broadside. The Tricolor listed hard, capsized and sank.