So you have an accident at sea; who investigates?

November 27, 2006 8:10 PM

So you have an accident at sea; who investigates?

Say you have an American citizen sailing out of an American port in a small boat. Half way to Hawaii (or Africa) the boat sinks. Eventually the captain is rescued and returned home. Who if anyone would investigate the accident?

posted by Tenuki to Law & Government (4 answers total)

It depends. Why would someone want to investigate? Who is it that you think cares?

If the owner files a insurance claim, then I imagine the insurance company might care enough to investigate. I doubt the Navy or Coast Guard would care unless there's a crime or piracy. (And even then, Maritime Laws are ancient and weird.) The boar mfr might care if it sounded like a design flaw.

That's all I can think of.
posted by cmiller at 8:15 PM on November 27, 2006

An incident involving a British-registered ship, or occurring in British waters, is investigated by the Maritime Accident Investigation Branch:

The Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) examines and investigates all types of marine accidents to or on board UK ships worldwide, and other ships in UK territorial waters. The sole objective of MAIB accident investigations is to determine the circumstances and causes of the accident with a view to preserve life and avoid accidents in the future, not to apportion blame or liability.

Their website has much more information.

In America, I think the NTSB plays a similar role, though its mission limits itself to 'major' marine accidents, and it's not clear whether they investigate incidents outwith US territorial waters.
posted by matthewr at 8:18 PM on November 27, 2006

Best answer: If you are outside territorial waters then maritime law applies. So typically no one will investigate a sinking, except the insurance companies or the victims. Under various circumstances (idiocy, usually) the family of the victims or the victims themselves have the marine equivalent of workers comp through the Jones Act. Being Union helps here. Passengers have the same civil recourse they do on land but must prove negligence which can be tricky depending on how deep the boat sank. If the Coast Guard are involved at all they will likely write up some kind of report and/or try to determine the cause of the sinking. If there are no witnesses or records of distress calls and it's outside territorial waters any private party or the insurance company can pay a salvage company to investigate the cause of the sinking (you can do that anyway but in this case you'd have to).

Criminally it's really no one's jurisdiction. Technically crimes against US citizens on registered US vessels on the high seas should be reported to the FBI who will investigate them. Crimes which occur in port are the problem of the local police. If a ship sank and foul play was suspected I am guessing that it would become a murder investigation out of whatever port the ship left last.
posted by fshgrl at 9:58 PM on November 27, 2006

Oops, left out a bit: The Jones Act only applies to seamen, not passengers. Passengers have to sue in court and some times are limited as to where they can bring suit.
posted by fshgrl at 10:00 PM on November 27, 2006