ABSTRACT
With the establishment of the International Safety Management (ISM) system all shipboard emergencies have been investigated and subsequently documented. This action has provided ships' Masters with guidelines to support their decision-making, in the event of a real-time emergency at sea. Amendments and Resolutions to the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) convention expect vessels to carry appropriate harmonized 'emergency plans' to provide guidelines for shipboard contingency planning for various types of emergency. Whenever a collision occurs, the vessel's positive watertight integrity is likely to suffer, and personnel may experience considerable shock, whether the collision is with another vessel, land mass or ice floe. Damage limitation is not commenced following the collision or the grounding incident. Damage limitation starts well before the incident takes place in the form of training, emergency planning, drills and acquiring the equipment and skills to perform damage-control action, as and when it is ever needed.
