SIFFS had recorded over 250 sea safety incidents on the west coast and have an informal a mechanism to report and record incidents among its members. Here are a few select cases from the SIFFS repository of marine accidents in the small scale fishery.
Two men, Amalraj (45), Lustin (37), set out to sea in a FRP Kattumaram from Kodimunai, Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu. At 2000 hrs they reached the fishing ground (23 fathoms) and laid out their gill net (Valiyavala). The craft was powered by a Lambardini 7 hp long tailed engine. They were carrying a hand-held GPS, a knife, a flashing light for the net and a compass. The sea turned choppy soon after they had laid out the net and the men decided to haul in the net and head back. After they had hauled in the net and were heading back, they sighted the side light (green) of a south-bound merchant ship and slowed down to let it pass. Since the ship was showing only one light, they assumed it would pass clear but they ended up getting very close to the ship and the combined effect of the rough sea and the wake of the ship's propeller flipped the boat over, throwing the men into the water. Lustin's leg had grazed the propeller of the long tail engine and was slightly bleeding. After the ship had passed, the men swam to the capsized boat. Since it was dark, the men held onto the overturned boat and waited for daybreak.
At daybreak, another ship passed them and they tried waving their lungi by climbing on the overturned boat but they weren't spotted. The whole day and night passed by without the men spotting another boat or ship. The men would try to sit on the hull of the overturned boat but the waves would toss them back into the water. The men then
disconnected the engine from the wreck but since the net was spread all over, the engine got snagged in the net and pulled the stern of the boat further into the water, leaving the bow above the water. The men had lost the knife and couldn't free the engine fouled by the net. They tried biting the net to clear the foul but couldn't succeed.
Just before daybreak, they spotted a light on the horizon. Lustin swam towards the light and as he approached the light, the sun rose, obscuring the light. He persevered and swam towards the general direction of the light and could make out a faint outline of a boat but it kept on getting fainter. The boat had moved away without detecting him. Lustin was smart enough to count the number of strokes he swam away from the capsized boat (about 1000 odd) so he retraced his path and swam back. (There was some confusion in his counting – Lustin says he forgot exactly how many strokes on his way back so he took some time to find the capsized boat but he located it,
nevertheless) When he returned, Amalraj was quite demoralized and fatigued and was constantly asking Lustin to help him survive. Lustin spent time pacifying him and propped him on the overturned boat whenever he felt he couldn't hold on to the wreck. Then, Amalraj developed loose stools, which greatly added to his already fatigued state. Lustin placed him spread-eagled on the wreck and held onto his
hands. Lustin then got on to the hull of the overturned boat and placed Amalraj's head on his lap and held him there. That night, Amalraj told Lustin that his end is nearing and that if he finds God, he will surely ask him to rescue him. These were the last coherent words spoken by Amalraj before he slipped into delirium and died.
Lustin waited till daybreak and then gathered together the jerry cans used as floats for the net and swam in the direction of the rising sun. While swimming, Lustin blacked out from the exhaustion and he came to when water got into his mouth. When he came to, he realized he had lost the jerry cans. After a few minutes, he found half a
watermelon floating in the sea. He recovered some of his energy after eating the fruit and continued swimming. Soon enough, he spotted a Thoothur shark hunter that had stopped for engine repairs and swam for it, waving his arms whenever possible. The men in the boat spotted him and took him on board. The depth of water in the area where he was rescued was more than 1500 meters and beyond the range of the onboard echo sounder.
Lustin was hospitalized on arrival and was discharged after 9 days, on 6 March 2007.
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A capsize is among the worst things that can happen to small boat fishermen.
When the weather turned rough, the men hauled in the net but failed to bundle and secure it to the boat. This was why they could not jettison the engine and make the boat upright. Since the net was spread all over, the engine got snagged in the net. The knife too was lost during capsize because it was not secured to the boat. All safety equipment must at all times be secured to the boat by a lanyard (small rope).
Some floatation device like a life buoy would have helped the men especially Lustin who chose to swim towards land. Extra fresh water in a jerry can and survival rations would have helped greatly, if they were carried secured to the boat.
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Preman hired two men, one July, after the monsoon ban on trawling and set out to sea with his gill net, from Mahe in Northern Kerala. The sea was moderate and he encountered no problems negotiating the surf on his way out but while returning, he realised the sea was becoming choppier and that if he went through the surf, he may capsize his boat and lose his catch. Preman decided to maneuver his craft away from the breaking surf and head towards deeper waters.
After he was clear of the surf, Preman steered the boat to deeper waters and decided to anchor so he could save on fuel -- Preman had about fifty litres of spare fuel in a jerry can. While at anchor, a freak wave capsized the boat and Preman found himself in water. When he looked around, he could see no one and he dived under the capsized boat and found the men trapped inside. When he freed them, he found one of them with his nose bleeding and the other apparently unhurt. He then bit the ropes off a few jerry can floats and told them to swim for the shore, holding on to the floats, and he remained with the capsized boat.
Preman was picked up by a trawler and one of the men managed to swim to safety. Two days later, a fishermen fishing off Vadakara (Kerala), saw a jerry cans floating in the sea and found the body of the man with the nosebleed. He was half-eaten by sea creatures.
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There is no doubt that a lack personal floatation devices and wrong decisions by Preman greatly added to this tragedy. The decision to anchor despite having sufficient fuel; the dispersal of the survivors from the capsized craft were two vital decisions that added greatly to the risk factor. If he was manoeuvering the craft instead of anchoring, he would have been more alert to freak waves and could have avoided
capsize. A boat at anchor leaves the men with no control to steer the boat and prevent the boat from getting hit by waves on the broadside.
When a boat capsizes, if all the men were to remain together, they would have a greater chance of being noticed and rescued by passing boats. Only the head of a man in water can be seen and three heads and a capsized boat are far more conspicuous than one head floating in the wide open sea. Preman responded to a gut-reaction carried over from the rowing days to swim to the shore for safety. Instead, he should
have kept the men with him and waited for someone to find them which
they did, finally.
That Preman had to bite the ropes to free the jerry can floats indicates clearly the need for a good jack-knife as part of the safety equipment to be carried by every boat. There have been instances of men getting entangled in their own ropes/nets during capsize and hence a jack knife dedicated for emergencies is unavoidable.
When a boat turns turtle, nothing can save men more than floatation devices. Life buoys or rings would be an intelligent choice as one of them can support more than one person and it can be readily grabbed. Life vests or jackets are for individuals and their stowage in small boats becomes difficult and wearing them after one is waterborne is also not easy.
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On June 25, 2000, three men, Justin, Peter and Christudasan, set out to sea from Vizhinjam harbour on a FRP fishing boat with a gill net. The sea was moderate to rough and as there was very little fish inshore that day, they set out for deeper waters and finally chose to shoot their nets in a place where there was no other boat in sight.
After the nets were laid out, Justin realised the engine had stalled and all efforts at reviving the engine failed. The boat began to drift with the predominant south-westerly current and for nearly 24 hours, they drifted without encountering any other craft. They didn't have any fresh water or food rations on board.
On the second day, the dehydrated and hungry men spotted a merchant ship. They tied up their clothes to an oar and waved frantically to the ship as it passed them but as their signal meant nothing to the merchant ship, they had to watch the ship pass them without any response. The heat of the sun and the increasing thirst forced the youngest member on board to drink sea water. The resulting vomiting increased his dehydration and soon a consensus was reached by the half-crazed men to drink their own urine. They collected their own urine and began to drink it to quench their thirst.
The fatigued men passed more merchant ships but unfortunately none of them responded to their distress call simply because their signals could not be understood and on July 2, after 7 agonising days of drifting southwards, the men found themselves in Sri Lankan waters and were located by fishermen from Sri Lanka and taken ashore.
Justin lost his boat, engine and his net and now works as a casual labourer in other boats; Peter and Christudasan are mentally ill and unfit for seafaring.
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The men could not communicate their distress to the merchant ships that passed them (on the second day) because they did not carry any distress signals that can be understood by merchant ships.
When fishing in shipping lanes, international distress signals like the sea rescue streamer and heliograph will help communicate distress effectively. A small boat with stalled engines does not appear to be in distress when viewed from a passing merchant ship and the men were ignorant of basic international distress signals like raising and lowering of outstretched arms. Merchant ships have state of the art communicating equipment on board and would have alerted the Coast Guard only if they knew the boat was in distress.
The men paid a heavy price for not carrying extra fresh water and survival rations and fishing in isolation.
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