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NTSB recommended cell phone ban should be enforced on the water

The National Transportation Safety Board’s call for a total ban in all states on cell phone use while driving a vehicle should apply to the water as well.

We at Vujasinovic & Beckcom have been urging the banning of any and all distractions that interfere with the safe navigation of a vessel such as cell calls and texting.

On Dec. 13, the NTSB announced their recommendations after numerous investigations of accidents caused by distracted drivers, particularly incidents involving texting behind the wheel.

One accident singled out by the NTSB was an Aug., 2010 Missouri pileup caused by a 19-year-old driver who sent or received 11 texts just before his pickup smashed into the rear of a tractor trailer. A school bus crashed into his truck followed by a second school bus ramming into the first. The buses were carrying about 50 high school students—most from a marching band—to a Six Flags amusement park. The pickup driver and a 15-year-old bus passenger were killed.

Though the NTSB cannot force states to impose a ban on cell phones for drivers, its recommendations carry weight with federal and state officials.

Currently 35 states and D.C. ban texting while driving. Novice drivers cannot use cell phones and drive in 30 states and D.C. School bus drivers cannot use cell phones and drive while carrying passengers in 19 states and D.C. Nine states, D.C. and the Virgin Islands have banned all drivers from using handheld cell phones while driving. President Obama signed an executive order prohibiting federal employees and contractors from texting while driving government vehicles or private vehicles on government business.

As usual, the maritime industry is behind the curve when it comes to enacting rules to protect life and property.

On a vessel, if it is proven that using a cell phone provided enough of a distraction to be a contributing cause of an accident, then there may be legal implications to the responsible party. But presently there are only recommendations and not laws specifically against using cell phones while navigating.

We argue—and it’s an easy argument to make—that there are far more distractions in driving a vessel than in driving a car. On a vessel, you have to serve as lookout; plot radar targets; simultaneously be aware of traffic from dead ahead, dead astern, on the beam and on the quarter; listen to and make VHF radio calls; look at charts; take fixes; and determine ETAs.

On July 7, 2010, Matthew R. Devlin, 35, of Catskill, NY, was piloting a tug pushing a 250-foot sludge barge that ran over a 33-foot “Ride the Ducks” boat on the Delaware River. Two teenage Hungarian tourists were killed as 35 passengers and two crewmembers plunged underwater.

Devlin made or received 21 cell phone calls and surfed the internet on a laptop, said the NTSB in its investigative report. He admitted being distracted from those activities for an extended time period before the collision and failed to maintain a proper lookout and piloted the vessel from the lower wheelhouse which had diminished visibility.

In two other cases, federal investigators determined that there was cell phone use and texting at the time of the accidents which distracted crew members from effectively performing their duties as lookouts.

One was the Dec. 20, 2009 collision between a Coast Guard vessel and a small pleasure boat in San Diego Bay that killed an eight-year-old boy and seriously injured four other persons. Four Petty Officers face possible Courts Martial and charges ranging from involuntary manslaughter, negligent homicide and dereliction of duty.

The second incident occurred 15 days earlier, when a Coast Guard vessel collided with a passenger excursion vessel in Charleston, South Carolina, injuring six passengers.

However, there were no specific cell phone use laws broken because there weren’t—and still aren’t—any of those laws in effect on the water.

From a legal perspective, the USCG says that every crew member on a small vessel underway is in fact a lookout and using a wireless device on the job may be a dereliction of duty.

Still, without any specific laws in place banning the use of mobile devices while navigating, there is not enough of an impediment to keep reckless mariners and boaters from using common sense and waiting until they are off duty to make that personal call.

(Information from the LA Times contributed to this article)

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