Fire on Board the Liberian Passenger Ship Ecstasy, Miami, Florida ...

Analysis 68 Marine Accident ReportLifejacket DistributionIn 1997, LR certified that the number, type, and arrangement of lifesavingequipment on board the Ecstasy met the requirements of SOLAS 74, as amended in 1998.At that time, the ship carried 4,094 lifejackets to outfit a full crew and passengercomplement of 3,560 people. The Board is pleased to note that Carnival Cruise Linessubsequently elected to exceed the minimum SOLAS requirement for extra lifejackets,increasing the number by more than 20 percent, to a total of 4,946. On the day of the fire,the ship was carrying 3,481 people, meaning that the ship had 1,465 extra lifejackets.Despite having more than enough lifejackets on board the vessel, some passengersperceived a lack of available lifejackets when the actions of the crewmembers were notconsistent with information provided at the practice drill and posted on stateroomplacards. Before the emergency, passengers were told to obtain lifejackets from theirstaterooms when the general alarm sounded and to proceed immediately to their musterstations. They were also told that if they were unable to obtain their lifejackets from theirstaterooms at the time of the alarm, they should proceed immediately to their musterstation and lifejackets would be issued to them. During the emergency, the cruise directorreinforced these instructions when he announced that passengers who could not obtaintheir lifejackets from their staterooms should proceed immediately to muster stations.The responses from the passengers who answered the Safety Board survey showedthat 79 of 126 people either obtained lifejackets from their cabin or were providedlifejackets by crewmembers. Forty-seven passengers said that they never receivedlifejackets. Two passengers stated that they became concerned when they asked forlifejackets and a crewmember started to pass them out and then reportedly was ordered tostop doing so. One passenger stated that one crewmember told her not to retrieve herlifejacket from her stateroom and later another crewmember told her to get her lifejacketfrom her cabin; however, when she attempted to do so, she could not reach her stateroombecause of the smoke.At the public hearing on the Ecstasy accident, the master testified that he wanted tomaintain a calm environment and avoid panic among the passengers by conveying theimpression that the situation was under control and did not warrant the distribution oflifejackets. While the lack of uniformity in distributing the lifejackets did not cause a masspanic, it did cause several passengers to become uneasy. Moreover, when a concernedpassenger attempted to return to her stateroom to retrieve her lifejacket, she was put at riskof potential injury. The Safety Board concludes that the lack of consistency between theinformation about lifejacket distribution provided at the practice drill and the actualprovision of lifejackets at the muster stations created unnecessary confusion among somepassengers on the Ecstasy.After the Ecstasy fire, in fall 1998, Carnival Cruise Lines began requiring itssenior deck, engineering, and other officers to attend courses in crisis management andhuman behavior and crowd management so that they met the STCW training standardsthat became effective in January 1999. The company also required crewmembers insafety-related positions to attend crowd management training.