Was El Faro an anti-hurricane device?

RandomVariable

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Jan 7, 2014
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I do not know this would actually be a conspiracy but something like that. There are some pieces of the story that do not quite fit right. Anyone have any thoughts or heard anything?
 
Yeah. The ship sank in the hurricane. Everyone on it died. The captain gambled he could outrun the storm, and didn't count on the engines failing. What parts of the story supposedly don't fit?

If it was an anti-hurricane device, it did a piss poor job.
 
Missing ship El Faro believed to be found...

U.S. Navy discovers wreckage believed to be cargo ship El Faro
Sat Oct 31, 2015 - Wreckage believed to be of the cargo ship El Faro, which was lost off the Bahamas along with its 33 crew during Hurricane Joaquin, was discovered on Saturday, U.S. officials said.
El Faro disappeared on Oct. 1 en route from Jacksonville, Florida, to Puerto Rico in the worst cargo shipping disaster involving a U.S.-flagged vessel since 1983, after the captain reported a "hull breach" and said a hatch had blown open. A search team aboard the U.S. Naval Ship Apache using sonar equipment discovered the wreckage on Saturday in the area of El Faro's last known position at a depth of 15,000 feet (4,572 meters), the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said in a statement. NTSB said officials planned to use a remotely operated submersible as early as Sunday to confirm the find. But it said the wreckage was consistent with a 790-foot (241-meter) cargo ship, and appeared to be intact in an upright position.

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The El Faro is shown in this undated handout photo provided by Tote Maritime in Jacksonville, Florida​

A video camera mounted on the submersible will be used to document the wreckage and debris field and locate the ship's voyage data recorder, similar to the black box on airplanes, the statement said. The discovery followed an earlier, failed attempt by the Apache to detect pings from El Faro's voyage data recorder by using equipment called a towed pinger locator. Most of El Faro's crew were American. NTSB officials said on Oct. 20 that the captain, aside from saying in a recorded satellite phone call that the El Faro was taking on water in one of the holds, had reported it had lost its main propulsion unit and engineers could not restart it.

The cargo ship's owner, New Jersey-based Tote Inc, has stated that loss of propulsion likely spelled the ship's doom. It was not yet clear if the hull breach was directly related to the loss of propulsion. Tote Services filed for protection in federal court in Florida on Friday, citing U.S. maritime law and saying the ship was "seaworthy and properly manned" and that the company bears no responsibility for its loss.

U.S. Navy discovers wreckage believed to be cargo ship El Faro
 
Lookin' for El Faro's 'black box'...

Search on for 'black box' in wreckage believed to be El Faro
Nov 1,`15 -- Sonar indicates that the wreckage believed to be the cargo ship El Faro landed upright on the ocean floor, which may aid efforts to recover the ship's voyage data recorder, a National Transportation Safety Board spokesman said Sunday. "The ship will certainly not be recovered; the ship is going to stay there. The containers are too deep to do any kind of recovery mission," said Peter Knudsen, NTSB spokesman. "If human remains are encountered, an attempt would be made to recover them."
Investigators are still awaiting video confirmation that the wreckage found Saturday in 15,000 feet of water east of the Bahamas is the El Faro, which went missing Oct. 1 during Hurricane Joaquin. All 33 crewmembers on board were lost. "What they detected with sonar was about the size and shape of the El Faro," Knudsen said by telephone with The Associated Press. Once that is confirmed, a remotely operated, deep ocean vehicle called CURV-21 will use its video camera to document the wreckage and debris field, as well as attempt to locate and recover the data recorder - the ship's "black box." That recorder would have captured the crew's conversations on the bridge as well as information about the ship's equipment, including engine performance and rudder movements.

The recorder would be on deck near the 790-foot ship's wheelhouse area, and its recovery would be more challenging if the ship had landed upside down, Knudsen said. "We do know the ship, from the sonar-generated images, does appear to be upright, so that's encouraging," he said. The recovery operations could take up to 15 days, depending on weather and sea conditions. The CURV-21 is designed to work up to a maximum depth of 20,000 feet of seawater, according to the Navy. The El Faro was reported missing east of the Bahamas, and it apparently came to rest at a depth greater than the final resting place of the Titanic, which lies over 12,500 feet down in the north Atlantic. "It's very, very challenging at those depths. Imagine operating something under about two-and-a-half miles of water with underwater currents and total darkness. Then you have the weather at the surface to account for," said Jim Staples, a ship captain and maritime consultant based in Norwell, Massachusetts.

Investigators will be looking for any significant signs of damage or visible clues as to whether the crew had time deploy life rafts, he said. "There may be a telltale sign like her back is broken or that she's split in half and that caused a quick sinking," Staples said. The El Faro's captain called in before the vessel disappeared, saying the ship had lost its engine power during its voyage from Jacksonville, Florida, to San Juan, Puerto Rico. The captain, Michael Davidson, said the ship was listing, and taking on water. An extensive Coast Guard search after the El Faro's disappearance found only floating debris and one body in a survival suit, which was not recovered. The El Faro was scheduled for retirement from Caribbean duty and for new retrofitting for service between the West Coast and Alaska, company officials have said. Both the El Faro and its sister ship were slated to be replaced by two new ships. Aboard when it disappeared were five engineers from Poland, who were working on the retrofitting as the ship sailed to Puerto Rico. NTSB investigators have said Davidson intended to pass 65 miles from the center of the storm - a risky decision, according to independent maritime experts.

News from The Associated Press
 
It's official - NTSB says the El Faro found...

Feds: Wreckage identified as ill-fated cargo ship El Faro
Nov 2,`15: Federal investigators have positively identified the wreckage found 15,000 feet deep in the sea as that of the ill-fated cargo ship El Faro.
The National Transportation Safety Board said Monday on Twitter that the survey of the area will continue. The ship sank in about 15,000 feet of water Oct. 1 during Hurricane Joaquin with 33 people aboard east of the Bahamas. No survivors were found.

The NTSB says sonar indicates the ship landed upright, which could help crews recover the ship's data record, or "black box." The agency says the U.S. Navy is continuing to survey the area around the wreckage.

News from The Associated Press
 
Navy finds El Faro navigation bridge...

Investigators Find Navigation Bridge of El Faro
Nov 13, 2015 -- Federal investigators on Thursday said they have found a key section of the El Faro, a cargo ship sunk by Hurricane Joaquin off the Bahamas last month, but a search team is still looking for a recording device that may help explain the ship's sinking.[/b]
The National Transportation Safety Board announced that U.S. Navy ship Apache, equipped with sonar devices and deep-diving submersibles, had located the ship's navigation bridge, where the captain and some of the crew would have been stationed as the El Faro drifted toward the eye of the Category 3 hurricane after losing power. The search mission mounted by the NTSB found most of the hull two weeks ago, sitting intact and upright 15,000 feet under water -- about 2,000 feet deeper than the Titanic -- near Crooked Island in the Bahamas.

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The Military Sealift Command fleet ocean tug USNS Apache (T-ATF 172) is fueled before departing Norfolk, Virginia, Oct. 19, 2015, to begin searching for wreckage from the missing U.S. flagged merchant vessel El Faro.​

The NTSB tweeted that searchers still have not located the all-important voyage data recorder or VDR. The recorder collects information, like ship data and communications, as well as conversations on the bridge, that could be useful in determining why the ship sank. "We were sent out to find the vessel, verify that it was the vessel and find the VDR," said Eric Weiss, spokesman for the NTSB. "We're still looking for the VDR." The search is currently contained within the debris field of the ship, which spans about a mile and a half. Since the initial discovery, the bulk of the ship was searched by a remote-controlled vehicle, called a CURVE-21, that can work deep underwater, withstanding pressures up to 20,000 feet. The 6,400-pound robot has a high-resolution camera and video capabilities in both color and black-and-white.

NTSB officials didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. In early October, the 790-foot-long cargo ship was swallowed, along with its crew of 33, by the 130 mph winds and towering seas of Hurricane Joaquin. The ship lost power during its weekly run from Jacksonville to Puerto Rico as it was on a course that many experts believe would take it dangerously close to a growing hurricane. NTSB officials later announced a hull had been breached and a hatch was blown. The Coast Guard received a few distress signals, but the hurricane conditions blocked a rescue and delayed the search for four days after the ship sank. So far only a single body was found but not retrieved.

Investigators Find Navigation Bridge of El Faro | Military.com
 
Wonder if it will tell the tale of the ill-fated ship?...

Sunken El Faro's data recorder found
Tue April 26, 2016 - Data recorder has been found in Atlantic; Thirty-three people were on board, including 28 Americans
The survivors of 33 sailors may finally get some answers into why the El Faro cargo ship sank in the Atlantic last October. Investigators say they located the critical data recorder early Tuesday. The National Transportation Safety Board says crews located the recorder 15,000 feet beneath the surface. Officials are figuring out how to recover the device, which records conversations, among other things. Officials resumed the search last week with advanced sonar and imaging systems. "Finding an object about the size of a basketball almost three miles under the surface of the sea is a remarkable achievement," NTSB Chairman Christopher A. Hart said.

Given that the data recorder has been submerged for seven months, value of the data is in question. The so-called "black box" may help answer many lingering questions about what happened to the ship during the final hours before it sank. The 40-year-old U.S.-flagged El Faro was headed to Puerto Rico from Jacksonville, Florida, and went missing near the Bahamas on October 1 with 33 people on board. The ship's 28 American crew members and five Polish nationals are presumed dead.

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U.S. Navy: El Faro wreckage found near Bahamas​

The owners of El Faro said the captain had a "sound plan" to avoid Hurricane Joaquin, but the ship's main propulsion failed, stranding the crew in the path of the Category 4 storm. The wreckage of the nearly 800-foot container ship was located in late October. It was in 15,000 feet of water near its last known position near Crooked Island. According to the NTSB, it was found in an upright position with the stern buried in about 30 feet of sediment. The bridge and the deck below, however, had separated and were not with the rest of the vessel.

The fact that the bridge separated was a chilling scenario to those in the industry. "I'm pretty sure it happened very quickly and very violently," Larry Legere, a ship captain based in Portland, Maine, said of the El Faro's sinking. "If it was enough to rip the bridge right off that ship, it was a very violent end, and probably why they didn't recover any survivors." The U.S. Coast Guard in February opened public hearings into the disaster.

Sunken El Faro's data recorder found - CNN.com
 
Data recorder from sunken cargo ship El Faro recovered...
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U.S. recovers data recorder from sunken cargo ship El Faro
Tue Aug 9, 2016 | WASHINGTON - The data recorder from the cargo ship El Faro, which sank near the Bahamas during a Caribbean hurricane last October, has been recovered, offering possible answers about why the vessel went down, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said on Tuesday.
The device, found late on Monday on the ocean floor after 10 months of searching, could provide navigational data and communications between crew members that could help determine what happened in the final hours before the 790-foot (241-meter) ship sank, officials said.

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The data recorder from the sunken wreckage of the freighter El Faro rests in fresh water on the USNS Apache after being recovered in the Atlantic Ocean​

All 33 crew onboard died when the ship sank off the Bahamas on Oct. 1, two days after leaving Jacksonville on a routine cargo run between Florida and Puerto Rico, before the storm intensified into a hurricane. It was the worst cargo shipping disaster involving a U.S.-flagged vessel in more than three decades. "The recovery of the recorder has the potential to give our investigators greater insight into the incredible challenges that the El Faro crew faced," NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart said in a statement.

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A closeup view of the El Faro navigation bridge is shown on the ocean floor taken by an underwater video camera​

A U.S. Coast Guard panel in May revealed the ship's captain intended to avoid the brewing storm when he departed, but may have had outdated weather data. Hart said investigators have a long road ahead in uncovering the reason for the sinking. "There is still a great deal of work to be done in order to understand how the many factors converged that led to the sinking," he said.

U.S. recovers data recorder from sunken cargo ship El Faro
 
El Faro's 'black box' comes up from Davey Jones' locker...
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El Faro's 'black box' reaches United States
Sunday 14th August, 2016 - El Faro's data recorder was recovered near the Bahamas this week; An NTSB lab near Washington will analyze whatever data it may hold
It will be a while before any information can be made available from the newly recovered data recorder of El Faro, a ship that sank with its entire crew last October, a National Transportation Safety Board official said Friday. The ship's black box was recovered from 15,000 feet below sea level near the Bahamas earlier this week and came ashore Friday morning in Jacksonville, Florida. Investigators are seeking insights into what happened in the hours before the the ship sank during Hurricane Joaquin. All 33 crew members went down with the ship; the 28 Americans and five Polish nationals are presumed dead.

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Besides navigational data, the recorder is supposed to store 12 hours of audio from the bridge, said Brian Curtis, acting director of the NTSB's office of marine safety. "Investigatively, that would be an asset to know what was going on on the the bridge and conversations they had," he said. The black box was flown to the NTSB's lab in Washington for analysis. "It will be some time before we can share the data," Curtis said. "It'll be even longer before we can share what it gives us for circumstances of the accident and how it may contribute to probable cause."

If any audio is on the box, only a transcript of it will be made public, said Curtis, who promised a timeline for the data release in a couple of weeks. The owners of El Faro said the captain had a "sound plan" to avoid Hurricane Joaquin, but the ship's main propulsion failed, stranding the crew in the path of the Category 4 storm. The 40-year-old U.S.-flagged El Faro was headed to Puerto Rico from Jacksonville, Florida, and went missing near the Bahamas on October 1.

El Faro's "black box" reaches United States - CNN.com
 
Captain's Errors Led Up To El Faro Sinking...
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Coast Guard Report: Captain Errors Led Up To El Faro Sinking
2 Oct 2017 | A Coast Guard report released Sunday says the primary cause of the 2015 sinking of the cargo ship El Faro, which killed all 33 aboard, was the captain underestimating the strength of a hurricane and overestimating the ship's strength.
The report said Capt. Michael Davidson should have changed the El Faro's route between Jacksonville, Florida, and San Juan, Puerto Rico, to avoid Hurricane Joaquin's 150 mph (240 kph) winds. When the 790-foot (240-meter) vessel got stuck he should have taken more aggressive measures to save it. Speaking at a news conference in Jacksonville, Florida, Capt. Jason Neubauer also said the Coast Guard would have sought to revoke Davidson's license if he had survived. Davidson "was ultimately responsible for the vessel, the crew and its safe navigation," said Neubauer, who chaired the investigation.

He said Davidson "misjudged the path of Hurricane Joaquin and overestimated the vessel's heavy weather survivability while also failing to take adequate precautions to monitor and prepare for heavy weather. During critical periods of navigation ... he failed to understand the severity of the situation, even when the watch standards warned him the hurricane was intensifying." Davidson, 53, was recorded telling a crew member a few hours before the sinking, "There's nothing bad about this ride. I was sleepin' like a baby. This is every day in Alaska," where he had previously worked. The report also says the ship's owner, TOTE Maritime Inc., had not replaced a safety officer, spreading out those duties among other managers, and had violated regulations regarding crew rest periods and working hours. The Coast Guard said it will seek civil actions against TOTE but no criminal penalties as there was no criminal intent.

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This undated image made from a video released April 26, 2016, by the National Transportation Safety Board shows the stern of the sunken ship El Faro.​

TOTE Maritime released a statement Sunday saying the report "is another piece of this sacred obligation that everyone who works upon the sea must study and embrace. The report details industry practices which need change." The 40-year-old El Faro went down on Oct. 1, 2015, sinking in 15,000 feet (4,570 meters) of water to the sea floor near the Bahamas. No bodies were ever recovered. It was the worst maritime disaster for a U.S.-flagged vessel since 1983. Voice recordings recovered from the ship show an increasingly panicked and stressed crew fighting to save the ship after it lost propulsion as they battled wind, shifting cargo and waves.

Davidson ordered the ship abandoned shortly before it sank but its open air lifeboats likely would have provided insufficient protection, the Coast Guard said. The agency said it would recommend that all ships now be equipped with modern enclosed lifeboats -- if the El Faro had such lifeboats, the crew may have survived, Neubauer said. El Faro was one of two ships owned by TOTE Maritime Inc. that navigated in constant rotation on shipping runs between Jacksonville, Florida, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. It brought everything from milk to Mercedes Benzes to the island.

Other findings included:
 

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