Here's how Mike Taugher and William Brand's story begins:
Federal investigators said today that two radars and the electronic charting equipment on the ship that ran into a Bay Bridge tower and spilled 58,000 gallons of fuel were tested and appeared to be working fine.
The announcement raised questions about statements by the pilot who told investigators Monday that he had problems with the equipment.
The laboratory that tested the equipment found it performed "as expected," Debbie Hersman, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board said Wednesday.
Hersman said investigators have not yet pieced together snapshots of radar images that are taken every 15 seconds, which will give them a more complete picture of how the radar was performing in the minutes before the Nov. 7 spill. [...]
The Oil Spill was the perfect "Accident waiting to happen". Yes, I know. THEY WILL FIND THE CULPRIT!! It is OK for me and you to make mistakes and correct their source and improve our lives. But, "They" only go as far as finding a culprit and we all feel so much better, don't we? "Hang the guilty!" as if that changes anything. What if the pilot was really "out of it" and that is why the charts made no sense to him. Do you know he was NOT tested until a couple of days later (contrary to federal law)? Actually, that would be the worst outcome for nothing will be done to remedy the REAL SYSTTEMIC and TECHNICAL problems that led to it.
Remember, if all excuses are eliminated then it was on purpose. Nobody wants to go there. What if some packages had been added to the bunker oil? What if the metal ship hit a bolt and sparked a fire? What else could have been placed in the same place where the 58,000 gallons of bunker oil were? Why did the officials expect the pilot to know if it was 140 or 58,000 gallons? Nobody inspects these tanks, evidently. You mean, they did not know how much fuel was in the ship? What else didn't they know? Why are they not required to know any of this? Don't they have 3D models of all ships in their computers?
Do they know where the pilot was with respect to place of contact with the bridge pier? Don't they know that there was NO WAY he could have known? What about the tug? How come nobody mentions the tug? Did they fail to warn the pilot? Did they have any way to talk with the pilot? Are they required to have redundant means of communications with the ship and the Control Center in Yerba Buena? Etc, etc. Why is there is no proximity warning radar at the bridge base, to be activated when large ships are close and send radio warnings? Etc.
Considering all this, and more, was allowed by our port officials and Homeland Security, we may begin to see why "It "Will take a year to get to the bottom of this" said, you-know-who. This does not pass the "smell test"?
Is it a coincidence that a year from now we will have a new president who might really get to the bottom of this? My guess, and it is only a guess, is that too many ignored the problem of security and do not wish to stir up anything and it is better take a little longer and see if the next Administration avoids a "cover-up"
If you compare how ships are handled in the bay and how airplanes are guided by Air Traffic Controllers in the air and on the SFO and OAK runways by NTSB and FAA, you will see a huge difference in management and responsibility and technology.
To call ship instrumentation and control "primitive" in comparison with airplanes is polite and kind and gross underestimation. Do you know that around 1954 a Douglas airplane took off in New York and landed in Los Angeles and the pilot never touched the controls? That ARPA had a competition, this year, of unmanned ground vehicles that moved in, albeit special, traffic to their destination, with nobody at the controls? Yet, a ship was unable to go through a huge space between bridge supports, at 10 mph, due to the fog? Airplanes land in total fog 30 times an hour at SFO (probably more now that they have better equipment) and they fly at over 200 mph and they have never hit anything. (Ops! One did hit a light, long ago, landed OK).
The security gap is too extreme to expect current officials admit their oversight. Better to wait until next year to find how vulnerable we are and have been. This is the point at which you hire two teams of contractors to review procedures and make recommendations and two independent government technical management agencies to manage and evaluate the review (RAND and NASA with some Astronauts?). If this is done now, it would only lead to a cover up -wait 'til next year. Bad news can wait.
Posted on Thu, 11/15/2007 - 00:25 — by CCTModerator
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 118
Here's how Mike Taugher and William Brand's story begins:
Federal investigators said today that two radars and the electronic charting equipment on the ship that ran into a Bay Bridge tower and spilled 58,000 gallons of fuel were tested and appeared to be working fine.
The announcement raised questions about statements by the pilot who told investigators Monday that he had problems with the equipment.
The laboratory that tested the equipment found it performed "as expected," Debbie Hersman, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board said Wednesday.
Hersman said investigators have not yet pieced together snapshots of radar images that are taken every 15 seconds, which will give them a more complete picture of how the radar was performing in the minutes before the Nov. 7 spill. [...]
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 216
The Oil Spill was the perfect "Accident waiting to happen". Yes, I know. THEY WILL FIND THE CULPRIT!! It is OK for me and you to make mistakes and correct their source and improve our lives. But, "They" only go as far as finding a culprit and we all feel so much better, don't we? "Hang the guilty!" as if that changes anything. What if the pilot was really "out of it" and that is why the charts made no sense to him. Do you know he was NOT tested until a couple of days later (contrary to federal law)? Actually, that would be the worst outcome for nothing will be done to remedy the REAL SYSTTEMIC and TECHNICAL problems that led to it.
Remember, if all excuses are eliminated then it was on purpose. Nobody wants to go there. What if some packages had been added to the bunker oil? What if the metal ship hit a bolt and sparked a fire? What else could have been placed in the same place where the 58,000 gallons of bunker oil were? Why did the officials expect the pilot to know if it was 140 or 58,000 gallons? Nobody inspects these tanks, evidently. You mean, they did not know how much fuel was in the ship? What else didn't they know? Why are they not required to know any of this? Don't they have 3D models of all ships in their computers?
Do they know where the pilot was with respect to place of contact with the bridge pier? Don't they know that there was NO WAY he could have known? What about the tug? How come nobody mentions the tug? Did they fail to warn the pilot? Did they have any way to talk with the pilot? Are they required to have redundant means of communications with the ship and the Control Center in Yerba Buena? Etc, etc. Why is there is no proximity warning radar at the bridge base, to be activated when large ships are close and send radio warnings? Etc.
Considering all this, and more, was allowed by our port officials and Homeland Security, we may begin to see why "It "Will take a year to get to the bottom of this" said, you-know-who. This does not pass the "smell test"?
Is it a coincidence that a year from now we will have a new president who might really get to the bottom of this? My guess, and it is only a guess, is that too many ignored the problem of security and do not wish to stir up anything and it is better take a little longer and see if the next Administration avoids a "cover-up"
If you compare how ships are handled in the bay and how airplanes are guided by Air Traffic Controllers in the air and on the SFO and OAK runways by NTSB and FAA, you will see a huge difference in management and responsibility and technology.
To call ship instrumentation and control "primitive" in comparison with airplanes is polite and kind and gross underestimation. Do you know that around 1954 a Douglas airplane took off in New York and landed in Los Angeles and the pilot never touched the controls? That ARPA had a competition, this year, of unmanned ground vehicles that moved in, albeit special, traffic to their destination, with nobody at the controls? Yet, a ship was unable to go through a huge space between bridge supports, at 10 mph, due to the fog? Airplanes land in total fog 30 times an hour at SFO (probably more now that they have better equipment) and they fly at over 200 mph and they have never hit anything. (Ops! One did hit a light, long ago, landed OK).
The security gap is too extreme to expect current officials admit their oversight. Better to wait until next year to find how vulnerable we are and have been. This is the point at which you hire two teams of contractors to review procedures and make recommendations and two independent government technical management agencies to manage and evaluate the review (RAND and NASA with some Astronauts?). If this is done now, it would only lead to a cover up -wait 'til next year. Bad news can wait.
Edited 11/22/2007 4:05 pm by MikeSar
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 179
It seems that poll should have allowed us to also blame:
George W Bush
Bill Clinton