- Ship Losses Surge by 57% in 2023, EMSA Data Reveals.
- Human Error Still Dominates Marine Incidents, Says EMSA 2024 Report.
- Search and Rescue Operations Increase as Ship Losses Rise in 2023.
The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) has issued its Annual Overview of Marine Casualties and Incidents for 2024 based on data compiled from 1 January 2014 to 31 December 2023. It offers an all-embracing review of marine incidents, revealing trends and major events over the last ten years, reports IIMS.
Annual Overview of Marine Casualties and Incidents 2024
In 2023, 2,676 reported marine casualties and incidents stood at a 0.6% increase from that of 2022. However, the number still decreased compared to 2021. For ten years, 26,595 incidents were recorded on average at 2,660 occurrences per year. Those for 2023 were slightly above this average but still showed a 0.6% increase from the previous year. The very serious casualties, which had reached as high as 106 in 2018, have been steadily decreasing to the current 45 in 2023.
A similar pattern had also been observed concerning ships and their involvement in marine casualties. In 2023, 2,896 ships were involved, having gone up from the preceding year but lower than what happened in 2021. Here again, the trend of casualties by cargo ships and fishing vessels has continually shown a downward movement as indicated by some improved performance in other sectors on the operation side of the seas.
Casualties and Fatalities
From 2014 to 2023, 650 lives were lost in 444 marine casualties, with a definite downward trend in fatalities. In 2023, 89.7% of those who lost their lives were crew members, a little above the ten-year average of 86.9%. The most common causes of death in the case of individuals were slipping, stumbling, and falls, while for ship-related incidents, collisions dominated.
Injuries were another essential area of the analysis, with a total of 7,604 injuries during the ten-year period as a consequence of 6,623 marine incidents. The number of injuries per year averaged out at 760, with 2023 accounting for a proportion of 85.2% injury to crew members, narrowly higher than the average for the entire ten-year cycle. The top causes for injuries in 2023 were physical stress or movement for people and collisions for ships, a replica of the ten-year summary.
Ships Lost and Damaged
The number of ships lost in 2023 increased sharply to 11, a 57.1% increase from the previous year. In addition, 695 ships were damaged, up by a sharp 52.6% from 2022. The number of vessels that were declared unfit to proceed increased to 215, a 12.6% increase.
Operational incidents were also witnessed to have increased significantly. Shore assistance was needed for 730 ships, and towing for 394 vessels, with increases of 16.8% and 13.9%, respectively. Cases of abandonment increased to 24 ships, which were mostly fishing vessels. Search and rescue operations also increased to 332, up by 5.4% compared to the previous year.
Safety Investigations
From 2014 to 2023, EU Accident Investigative Bodies opened 1,196 investigations and published 1,001 safety reports. In 2023, only 75 investigations were opened, representing a sharp 21.9% decline from 2022 and marking a steady decline in investigations since 2018.
This report outlines the importance of human factors in marine casualties. From the ten years reviewed, 58.4% of accident events were connected to human action, and 49.8% of the contributory factors were linked to human behaviour. Therefore, it indicates that human factors make up 80.1% of the entire accidents reviewed, which necessitates strong human-centred safety measures on all ship types.
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Source: IIMS
