Check Your Lifejacket
What checks should you do
Fishermen should regularly check that the gas cylinders are firmly tightened into the release units on their lifejackets.
Owners of lifejackets fitted with manual or automatic release units should also regularly carry out the safety checks listed in any booklet supplied with a lifejacket.
These are:
You don’t know when you will need to abandon ship and this will often happen very quickly. Make sure lifejackets are quickly and easily accessible.
What can happen if you don’t do these checks – A case history
Whilst trawling a vessel’s net became snagged on the seabed. Attempts were made to free the net but the vessel started to list heavily, prompting the six man crew to muster on deck. The vessel quickly capsized and sank.
Three of the crew who had been working on deck were already wearing inflatable lifejackets. The skipper and the engineer both donned theirs whilst the mate, realising that his was stowed below deck, had no time to collect it before the vessel started to sink and was forced to abandon ship without one.
Before abandoning the vessel, the five crew wearing lifejackets tried to inflate them manually by pulling the release toggles, rather than waiting for automatic inflation on taking to the water. Only one of the five lifejackets inflated.
Three of the crew managed to board the liferaft,As in most cases, they all ended up in the water. Whilst attempting to board the upturned liferaft one of the men disappeared. He was one of those whose lifejackets had failed to inflate. He was never seen again.
Further information
If you would like any more information on above and/or the availability of any other fishing safety information please write to the Fishing and Code Vessel Safety Branch, Maritime and Coastguard Agency, Spring Place, 105 Commercial Road, Southampton, SO15 1EG, Fax: 023 8032 9161 or leave a message on 023 8032 9150
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