Safety blasted by Torres skippers
19.04.2007
TWO skippers of Immigration Department boats similar to the one that sank in the Torres Strait in 2005, killing five people, told a coronial inquest yesterday the boats collected water when they were used for initial short-trial patrols.
Harry David, who was employed by the Immigration Department on Yam Island as a movement monitoring officer, said that he travelled from Saibai Island to his home on Yam Island at 10 knots in uncomfortable, rough weather because it was safer than travelling at five knots, when water kept coming in over the back of the boat and was not discharged, as it should have been.
His departmental colleague, Beimop Tapim, from Murray Island, said the vessel assigned to him, Zeuber Erkep, collected more than 60 litres of rainwater in the hull when it was left uncovered on land.
The evidence was given yesterday at the inquest into the October 2005 sinking of the Malu Sara at it travelled from Saibai Island to Badu, a voyage of 74km across open seas.
Mr Tapim said he and the other five boat skippers attended a workshop on Saibai Island, where they were supposed to be trained on the newly-supplied twin-engine vessels and the use of new satellite telephones.
He said he was told the Malu Sara, being driven to the workshop from Badu Island by his colleagues Wilfred Baira and Ted Harry, had ``oil and engine trouble and there was a bit of water in the boat''.
Mr Tapim said oil was taken out to the Malu Sara, before it arrived at the workshop. The vessel was returning to Badu at the completion of the workshop on October 15 when it sank.
Mr Tapim said that at the workshop he accompanied other movement monitoring officers on a trial run in sister vessel Malu Gauthat and when it was being reversed from the mooring it took water over the back, causing the skipper to tell passengers to move to the bow.
In other evidence yesterday, Cairns harbourmaster Alan Boath said he considered the installation of a global positioning system to be a minimum requirement in a boat being used on patrols in the Torres Strait. He said the confluence of the waters meeting in the narrow straits made boating hazardous, and that the straits were dangerous waters where the tide speed alone sometimes reached 7.5 knots.
He said also that a marine radio was necessary, and it was not recommended that skippers rely only on telephones.
The six boats supplied to the Immigration Department officers on the islands were not equipped with a GPS, a marine radio, a depth sounder or sea anchors. Captain Boath said a suitable GPS would cost about $1500 fitted.
