MAIB report reveals six safety lessons for workboat operators

Towage risks, shared understanding of manoeuvres, risk assessment, watchkeeping and communications, passage planning and maintenance were the main factors to come out of the Marine Accident Investigations Branch 2025 report.

Towage risks need active management

In February 2023, Clyde Marine Services’ tug Biter was assisting the cruise ship Hebridean Princess when the tug girted and capsized, killing both crew members.

The MAIB identified five safety issues: the towage plan was not understood and agreed by all parties; the tug’s gob rope was unable to withstand force exerted on it; the passenger vessel’s speed exceeded port guidance; open watertight doors prevented the tug remaining afloat; and there was inadequate training and experience.

The report also records the continuing recommendations arising from the Svitzer Mercurius investigation, following the failure of a towline pennant that injured five crew as it assisted the container ship CMA CGM Marco Polo into Southampton in December 2019. The recoiling towline shattered a wheelhouse window, injuring the crew.

The MAIB identified insufficient induction for temporary crew due to commercial pressure; ineffective vessel condition assessment; ineffective tow winch maintenance; failure to identify the pennant as unfit for purpose; and the inability of wheelhouse windows to withstand towline snapback impact.

The resulting recommendation to Svitzer was to undertake a fleetwide risk assessment of towline failure and snapback and the potential for a recoiling line to impact wheelhouse windows.

Everyone involved needs to understand manoeuvre

The Biter investigation also produced a specific recommendation concerning communication between pilots, bridge teams and tug crews.

The MAIB recommended that the UK Maritime Pilots’ Association, British Ports Association, UK Harbour Masters’ Association, British Tugowners Association and The Workboat Association develop guidance emphasising the importance of a pilot/tug exchange, in addition to the master/pilot exchange. The purpose is to ensure that the pilot, bridge team and tug crew have a common understanding of the intended manoeuvre, potential hazards and their respective roles.

The MAIB recommends pilot/tug information exchanges are formalised and routinely carried out.

The Biter findings also recommend that ports review their tug matrices and pilotage limits, and consider requiring tugs and workboats routinely operating within statutory harbour areas to be fitted with and operate AIS transponders.

Risk assessments need to reflect actual operations

The MAIB’s findings involving smaller commercial vessels repeatedly identify failures in risk assessment and safety management.

In March 2023, on the coast of Anguilla, an 11m Anguilla-registered commercial day-excursion boat entered a cove where large ground seas had developed. The boat was overwhelmed, throwing its four passengers and two crew into the water. The mate and one female passenger died.

The MAIB identified safety issues: ineffective safety management system; maritime operation not risk assessed; and no passage plan. Recommendations included the development and implementation of a marine safety management system and ensuring that the relevant safety-management requirements formed part of small commercial vessel inspections.

The Lundy Explorer, a commercial high-speed RIB, was also found to have Ineffective safety management in place. Lundy Explorer was a commercial high-speed RIB that took customers on sea-safari trips. While leaving Ilfracombe Harbour in June 2023, it encountered a high wave and slammed into an oncoming wave, knocking a passenger off her forward jockey seat and fracturing her spine, resulting in permanent paralysis.

The MAIB identified an inappropriate passenger seating arrangement, inadequate safety briefing and unpredictable local environmental conditions. It recommended operating procedures were put in place to cover pre-departure considerations and actions if conditions changed, a pre-departure safety brief, risk assessments that accurately reflect potential hazards, and the use of jockey seats.

Watchkeeping and communications remain fundamental

In September 2023, the dive workboat Karin was operating in Scapa Flow, Orkney, when it hit a recreational diver carrying out a decompression stop. The diver was killed by the vessel’s rotating propeller.

The MAIB has responded with three straightforward safety findings: ineffective watchkeeping; inadequate communication between vessels and ineffective risk mitigation.

The MAIB calls for a further risk-based review of recreational diving operations, including the control and monitoring of diving support operations and the number of vessels permitted to operate simultaneously.

In July 2024, the tender to Isabell Princess of the Sea collided with the drifting RIB Vega in Göcek, Turkey. Travelling at about 27 knots in the inner harbour, the tender drove over Vega, trapping its sole passenger, who drowned.

The MAIB’s has recorded high-speed unplanned passage at night; no effective lookout; and inadequately defined responsibility and authority.

The findings from these incidents are particularly relevant to workboats because their operations can involve multiple vessels, divers, survey personnel, harbour traffic, fast craft and changing operating areas. Effective lookout, clear responsibilities and communication between vessels remain basic but critical controls.

Passage planning is not just a merchant vessel issue

In July 2024, the 21.9m dive support vessel Jean Elaine grounded on a falling tide while manoeuvring out of Saint Peter’s Pool in Deer Sound, Orkney. The vessel listed severely and took on water before being abandoned, but there were no injuries or fatalities.

The MAIB identified the lack of a passage plan, poor coordination between the skipper and dive team, the vessel’s lack of certification and its poor hull condition as key safety issues.

The Calypso 2 investigation similarly said there was no passage plan, while other MAIB investigations continue to show the consequences when planned operations diverge from actual practice.

For smaller commercial vessels, short voyages, familiar waters and frequent harbour movements can make formal planning appear unnecessary. The MAIB findings do not support that assumption. Passage planning, communications and operational risk assessment remain identified safety controls for workboats and small commercial vessels.

The issue is not the length of the passage but whether the risks associated with the intended operation have been properly considered, the report says.

Maintenance and equipment standards

The Svitzer Mercurius findings provide a particularly clear example of suboptimal equipment monitoring, with ineffective tow-winch maintenance resulting in contamination and subsequent slippage, alongside failure to identify the condition of the towline pennant.

The Jean Elaine investigation identified hull defects as one of its safety issues.

The MAIB report also records a preliminary assessment involving the standby safety vessel Vos Tracker in August 2025, in which two people went overboard during maintenance of the fast rescue craft. Both men were recovered unharmed, but the FRC was damaged.

For tug and workboat operators, equipment condition is not just a maintenance matter – towlines, winches, ropes, hulls, recovery equipment and other safety-critical equipment can all be faulty links that break the chain.