Dag Pike draws on his experience as merchant navy captain, fast boat
navigator and boat safety tester for RNLI lifeboats to focus on a wide
range of disasters at sea. He compiles a wide range of accounts of
yachts, motorboats and commercial vessels running into difficulty as a
result of poor navigation, fog, miscalculation, human error, weather
conditions etc and analyses in a readable and entertaining fashion what
caused the disaster, what went wrong, how it was dealt with and the
lessons learned from it.
Examples
range from the Fastnet disaster, powerboat races, boats run down in the
Channel, to trawlers pulled under by submarines, ferry accidents and
tanker and cargo ship disasters. The incidents include grounding,
collision, fire, sinking, ice and storms, and each chapter has an
example from the Marine Accident Investigation Bureau who monitor
incidents at sea.
This book is a fascinating read for all who go afloat either for
business or pleasure, and for anyone interested in just why disasters
happen at sea.