Exito was a steel-hulled vessel built as an oil field vessel for the Gulf of Mexico in 1956. On 6th December 2016 when the accident occurred, Exito was under a charter agreement with Trident Seafoods Corporation for hauling waste materials from their fish processing plant to the offshore mixing zone. On that fateful day, Exito was to sail from Dutch Harbor to Akutan island where it had sailed a day earlier to pick up Trident Seafoods cargo. Among the crew members were three men contractors working for Acuran company tasked with non-destructive inspections of refrigeration piping at the Akutan processing plant.
Cargo was loaded on the Exito throughout the day on December 6. When the loading was complete about 1630, the captain set the return trip departure time to Akutan for that evening noting that sea conditions would be less favorable if they waited to depart the following morning ( Kristiansen, 2013) . At about 1850, the Exito left Dutch Harbor destined for the seven hours voyage back to Akutan. According to the captain, on board the Exito was twelve 55-gallon drums of anti-freeze, two or three pallets of air filters, and two crates of tools weighing about 10,000 pounds, pelican cases weighing about 850 pounds and an X-ray machine.
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The vessel proceeded outbound from Unalaska Bay on a north-northeasterly course toward Akutan Pass at a speed of about 6 knots where the captain is said to have experienced progressively increasing seas from directly ahead forcing him to adjust his course about 10 degrees to port to make the voyage comfortable. Sometime after 2122, the captain called the ship owner and informed him that something was not good and that he intended to turn back to Dutch Harbor. At this point, pallets of filters and pallets of barrels had begun shifting which shortly after broke loose. Continuous waves hit the starboard rail prompting the captain to sound the general alarm and made a distress call on the VHF radio. Again, the captain called the ship owner and informed him that he could not resolve the situation on board and also provided him with the exact position of the vessel and that they were donning immersion suits and preparing to launch the liferaft. The shipowner called the Coast Guard Sector Anchorage command center and reported the exact Exito position. The Coast Guard noted that they had no VHF reception coverage in the accident area and had not received the distress call.
However, none of the contractors had assembled at the wheelhouse even after the captain had sounded the general alarm prompting him to go down to gather them. The captain helped the contractors done their immersion suits and assisted them towards the wheelhouse deck. The captain retrieved his immersion suit and made a final distress call on the VHF radio which he received a response from a fishing vessel Afognak Strait , informed them of the Exito position and announced that they were abandoning the vessel. All this time the one contractor was trying to help his colleague who was resisting to exit. The captain left the contractors after resisting to exit and rushed to help the deckhand lift and launch the liferaft. After launching the liferaft, the captain went back to wheelhouse door to assist the two contractors still inside, but the vessel went under water as he was trying to re-enter.
The Afognak Strait which was about 4 miles away from Exito when they received the Exito distress call arrived at the accident scene at 2244 and recovered the survivors. Though none of the survivors was injured, two contractors went down with the vessel and were never traced. Additionally, there was severe environmental damage as estimated 2,000 gallons of diesel fuel, twelve 55-gallon drums of ethylene glycol (anti-freeze) and one industrial X-ray machine (hazardous material) were released into the sea. Also, the vessel valued at approximately $ 310,000 and cargo estimated at about $ 500,000 was lost.
From the Exito fatality, it is worth learning that uninspected vessels should not be allowed to have credentialed personnel on board. Additionally, all ship crew should be well trained in marine safety training as they may help to rescue those onboard the ship ( Marcus & Rosekind, 2017) . Further, all the crew members and other personnel on board should at first be briefed on vessel safety, try fitting their immersion suits and place their suits at precise positions where they will retrieve them easily in the event of an accident ( Kristiansen, 2013) .
References
Kristiansen, S. (2013). Maritime transportation: safety management and risk analysis . Routledge.
Marcus, J. H., & Rosekind, M. R. (2017). Fatigue in transportation: NTSB investigations and safety recommendations. Injury prevention , 23 (4), 232-238.
