LACK OF COMMUNICATION LED TO SERIOUS MAIN ENGINE PROBLEMS IS KEY FINDING
The Swedish P&I Club has published a case study following serious damage caused to a ship’s main engine. As a consequence of poor communication water contaminated the lubrication oil causing severe damage to the engine.
Engineers on a bulk carrier were conducting scheduled maintenance on one of the ballast pumps. They had closed all the isolating valves to the ballast pump and put up notices about the job in the engine room and engine control room, but not on the bridge. They didn’t finish the job on the first day, so continued the next day.
The next day the Master asked an officer to print out the alarm list for the ballast water management system, prior to arriving at the next port as a port state inspection would take place. To get the list the officer had to start the ballast water management system, which he did.
The bilge high level alarm was activated in the engine room. An oiler checked the bilges and could see water pouring in, covering the tank top. An engineer turned off the power to the ballast water management system.
He found that two ballast system valves were open from the main seawater crossover suction line. He closed these valves to stop the ingress of the water. These valves had been opened automatically when the ballast water management system started. The engineers pumped the water from the tank top into the bilge holding tank.
An hour later the M/E bearing wear alarm – Water Level 50%, went off. The lube oil for the crank case had 0.09% of water in it. The second lubricating oil purifier was started. A little later the M/E bearing wear alarm went off again. A second sample of the lube oil was taken, and it was found that the oil had 0.08% of water in it.
The chief engineer decided to partially change 3,000 litres of lubrication oil for the crank case. A third sample was taken and the water content was 0.019%.
Subsequently, the engine stopped and a full change of the lube oil was performed. A crosshead bearing was opened for inspection. No damage was found. Nevertheless, one of the rubber diaphragm seals for draining the crankcase to the system lubricating oil tank was found to be defective. This caused the water flooding into the engine room to contaminate the lube oil.
Read the story in full at
https://bit.ly/2sU96Dy
GUIDELINES FOR SAFE CARRIAGE OF DIVINYLBENZENE IN CONTAINERS ARE PUBLISHED
The Cargo Incident Notification System (CINS), the International Group of P&I Clubs and the TT Club have published industry guidelines for the carriage of Divinylbenzene (DVB) in containers.
DVB is a chemical prone to polymerization (a form of self-reaction). When shipped in bulk, DVB polymerization can lead heat and flammable gas to be generated. Thus, the stowage of containers carrying DVB aboard vessels can present a risk of explosion and fire, if they are not properly presented for carriage.
As a series of polymerization incidents took place from the carriage of DVB by sea in 2018 the IMO approved changes to the way that polymerizing substances, like DVB, are carried, by amending the IMDG Code. These changes are included in amendment 39-18 of the IMDG Code, which will be mandatory from 1 January 2020, but may be applied voluntarily from 1 January 2019.
To ensure the safe carriage of DVB in containers before 1 January 2020, these guidelines highlight the practices set out in the IMDG Code amendments. They also recommend that these must be followed now, on a voluntary basis.
Read the full story and access the guiuidelines at
https://bit.ly/2FO6D5U
The Report • March 2019 • Issue 87 | 17
Safety Briefings
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