If one can read the poem Rime Of The Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge one can imagine & feel the awful experience of the voyage,
“Water, water, everywhere
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere
Nor any drop to drink”.

Sometimes nature can resort to taking deadly revenge against the humankind for their excessive carelessness, ignorance in maintaining ecology and for giving excess priority to the scientific research which can perhaps be detrimental to mankind & as well as nature. Tsunami, disastrous storms, unnatural & abnormal flow of the winds, increasing internal temperature of earth , unequal proportion of the corals, sea fish, sea birds, minerals, & many other living objects which are affected for the many reasons like oil spill, burst of an oil tankers, or the drowning of ship.

According to the Archimedes Principle ships float on water with help of buoyancy force. Sometimes heavy & rough tide, any mechanical fault can be the cause of a fatal accident. Oil leak can also be the major cause of the maritime accident. In 2007 there was a ship accident took place due to a significant oil leak & the ship just broke into two parts in the middle sea. This accident was called as a catastrophe for the environment. Approximately 290 tons of heavy fuel oil had poured out onto the sea due to this fatal accident. The coastal area were heavily affected because of it and it is also reported that the oil is still is there and the sea birds are badly affected for the oil spill.

As an instance we can also mention the causes of rapid sinking of the Titanic. The actual cause is that accident is considered as the misjudgment of the size of an ice berg. When there was a collision between the ship & ice berg the accident happened ,a fragile fracture of the hull steel and the wrought iron bolts failed due to the collision.The brittle fracture could also have happened due to the variation of temperature, high impact stocking, and high sulphur content. On the night when theTitanic disaster took place, amazingly these three factors were there. The temperature of the water was running below freezing ( -48 to -54 degree centigrade) , the Titanic was passing through the waters at a high speed when it was just collided with the iceberg, and the hull steel enclosedwith high levels of sulphur. such an incident can repeat itself today also & can be the cause of a major maritime accident.

We can take our lessons from the past so it can be hardly chances to repeat the situations. However sometimes poor design may also be the cause of major accident. When a ship is grounded &strikes something in water, the lowermost plate of the hull can be pierced without damage sustained to the top plate and with a double bottom, a wounded hull would allow water into the watertight partitions. In case of a collision with another ship or an ice berg can completely damage the hull.

There can be many minor causes that can lead to major accidents at sea. Special investigation teams look for the main cause of the accident but a little care can go a long way in preventing major accidents.

Minor Causes Major Accidents at Sea, 8.3 out of 10 based on 3 ratings