Dangers ahoy!

This year's Safety at Sea campaign is in full swing. The director of the Maritime Institute, Reuben Lanfranco, spoke to Vanessa Macdonald about the new challenges and looks at some other ways to improve safety and courtesy at sea.

The need to control the use of non-traditional craft has become all the more important as most accidents nowadays are no longer between similar craft, but between different categories.

Reuben Lanfranco, director of the Maritime Institute within the Malta College of Arts, Science and Technology, believes there is now a very advanced level of awareness of most safety issues among boat owners and that the problems are closer to the shore.

"You still get certain boats coming in to the pontoons at a relatively high speed. The speed limit in harbours is 10 knots, but there are also regulations regarding general speed. These say that in particular circumstances you may need to reduce your speed even more. If the wake you are producing is affecting other boats, you might need to proceed at dead slow speed."

Sailing boats in particular often complain about the wake caused by motorboats, not just in yachting centres but even out at sea; inconsiderate mariners, Capt. Lanfranco said, can be reported to the police even if there is no collision. It is sufficient for them to have been behaving in a way that could possibly lead to collisions or injuries.

The biggest problem is that few cases are reported in the first place and even fewer go to court as people are so reluctant to testify against the abusers.

To make matters worse, cases used to get thrown out of court because it was impossible to prove just how fast a boat was travelling but the law enforcers now get around this by charging someone under the general speed provision.

Capt. Lanfranco takes a very broad view of the institute's educational remit and does not only consider mariners. He also thinks swimmers have a responsibility for their own safety.

"Even a person in a swimmers' zone has to pay attention to the lane reserved for seacraft," he cautioned.

Courtesy is just as much of a problem as safety. People swim from slipways while others leave their trailers there, he said.

People also sometimes abuse mooring areas, spending hours having a barbecue in places that are strictly speaking for loading and unloading.

"Divers who go out without the appropriate markers are another danger. But new problems crop up every season. The latest headache is what I call torpedoes, which pull people along and can submerge to a depth of a few metres.

"There is not much regulation about them yet and the authorities do not know whether to consider them as power driven vessels or just toys."

The regulations are aimed at power-driven craft, but as Capt. Lanfranco said, even a windsurfer travelling at speed can kill a swimmer.

Blatant abuse of the rules does not help. Speedboats should not pull skiers off the beach but should use a launching area some distance away, which rarely happens. And paragliders are often pulled airborne directly from the beach, which can also be very dangerous should they stumble.

The problems are by no means unique to Malta. A number of countries, including Malta, are evaluating the possibility of an EU boating licence to be introduced within the next two years.

An EU licence would make it far easier to ensure that people who rent boats while on holiday know at least the basic skills. Malta would have an advantage as the local course is one of the most comprehensive, even though is not recognised elsewhere.

"In Germany, you cannot hire a boat without a German licence. I am not saying that this is the way to go but at least those who hire out boats or jet skiis should at the very least give people instructions and tell them what the regulations are. Some outlets stick to the rules and are very prudent, but others do not."

Capt. Lanfranco would like to see the 2001 regulations tightened up in other ways. For example, they say that one has to be 18 to have a boat licence but do not specify that one has to be 18 to drive a boat, which could create a legal loophole.

"There should be something to say that you cannot drive any power-driven craft unless you are 16 or 18 at least. As it is, if you have an eight-year-old driving a 40hp craft, you could not charge him under any provision."

Another problem is people driving under the influence of drink or drugs. Capt Lanfranco would prefer to see direct legislation relating to boats.

"There are so many potential dangers apart from collisions, like people falling overboard. If this happened at night, unless you notice straight away, the chances are that you would simply not find them. As a general rule it takes eight times as long to find someone at night as during the day. This is why searches are so often suspended at night."

He believes the time has come for a system similar to that of wardens, with fines that can be ticketed there and then, just as is done on land.

"This would save taking the case to court, which takes up considerable time and keeps resources away from where they are required. All you need is legislation to make certain offences directly enforceable," he suggested.

The enforcers would need to be able to identify boats. Although they should all have registration numbers, these can be falsified, so the AFM and the police would like to get an updateable database from MMA of all registered boats.

"Perhaps the MMA can issue a sticker or identification plate for boats similar to car registration plates, which could be more difficult to forge."

There are other anomalies in the regulations. For example, a 10-knot limit is imposed in harbours but the schedule of harbours omits Marsaxlokk, Marsascala, Mellieha Bay and St Paul's Bay, to name but a few.

Likewise, Vittoriosa has not yet been included as a yachting centre, so the five-knot speed limit does not apply there. And what about the Portomaso marina? There have been cases where the AFM were frowned upon for entering as it was "private", he said.

Maritime Institute: course highlights

Courses for mariners were introduced in 2001 and the Maritime Institute was thrown in at the deep end.

The regulations that introduced the need for courses were issued in June 2001, by when the Nautical School in Floriana had already ceased to exist, as the Maritime Institute was planned to replace it in October that year as one of the six institutes of the Malta College for Arts, Science and Technology.

"According to the regulations everyone had to have their licence by September but there was nobody to train them and the system was not in place!" he chuckles now, in retrospect.

All they could do was roll up their sleeves and jump in, clearing up a couple of rooms at the new premises in Villa Portelli to use as lecture rooms.

"Even though we were not strictly speaking operational as MCAST, we were running four courses a day from 9 a.m. till 11 p.m. and managed to process quite a large number of people."

The 2001 regulations took over from the 1985 speedboat and waterskiing regulations, which were issued at a time when there were a considerable number of waterskiing accidents.

Over the years, the situation has changed. Waterskiing has been all but replaced by jetskis, paragliders and now even parakites.

"The need for the new regulations was long felt but they do take time to come into force," he said.

"We are basically here to try to educate, not to regulate or to legislate. Our role is to train people and raise awareness.

"At the end of the day people should not feel that they are doing these courses because they are mandatory but because they are needed."

A number of people started the course full of resentment and cynicism about their usefulness, especially those who have had boats for some time. However, it is a source of great satisfaction to Capt. Lanfranco that they all eventually realise how much there was that they did not know.

"They eventually admit that it was worth every minute!"

Every module of the course emphasises safety. "We have no intention of training people to become engineers to fix their boats but we do talk to them about fault finding, for example. We teach them about communications and the use of radio, as well as about distress signals. There are talks on the right knots for the right purposes, and boat handling such as berthing, recovering a man overboard and so on," he said.

The cost of a two-week course is Lm55. The first week consists of five sessions lasting three hours each; the second week comprises practical sessions, including firefighting and boat handling.

The firefighting lessons last four hours each and there is also a practical assessment during which manoeuvring skills are assessed.

The course ends with a 15-20 minute interview. The examiner is appointed by the Malta Maritime Authority for the sake of transparency.

The licence costs Lm10 and it is valid for 10 years.

At the moment the course is obligatory for people with boats that have 100hp engines or stronger (in fact also for boats which can exceed 12 knots, although this is not at present being enforced).

The government has already stated that it intends to bring the power limit down to 70 or 75hp but has not indicated when. Eventually, the course would apply to even basic engines.

This poses a headache as the institute does not want to get caught out the way it was in 2001. Capt. Lanfranco has, however, already noted that some mariners who follow the course are not obliged to do so by law, including some who do not yet own a boat.

He is also encouraging people to attend the winter courses, which are far less crowded than the summer ones, which often have a waiting list.

"Then you are free to enjoy the long summer evenings. You might as well get the course over and done with in winter."