Openness

We have published below a copy of an internal DOT document, dated 16th February 1977, which suggests that, at the time it was written, government officials in the Department for Transport (DOT) were actively suppressing the results of the TRIDENT/GAUL model experiments.

As we have shown in an earlier post, the Gaul had inadequate stability for her intended service - a fact which was never disclosed during the 2004 formal investigation.

No records

When Moses received God’s commandments, he didn’t have any paper to write them down on. Still, he dutifully carved them onto clay tablets, which he carried all the way down the mountain to show his people the proof.

More than three millennia down the line, the UK Department for Transport, inexplicably, are not even able to store the instructions received from their earthly superiors, and the reasons behind some of their most important decisions are not kept in any decipherable form.

As already mentioned in a previous post, in response to our FOI request of 4 July 2008, the DfT informed us that they held “no specific technical justification [of their decision not to re-hear the Gaul RFI] recorded in any form”. Within the same reply, the DfT also mentioned that their earlier decision “fully sets out the Secretary of State’s reasoning in relation to the re-opening of the investigation”.

Unaware of what that reasoning was, we have formally asked them, via another FOI request (dated 11 September 2008), to provide us with a full account of the reasoning behind the Secretary of State’s decision not the re-open the Gaul Formal Investigation.
The DfT’s response to this latest enquiry, received on 13 October 2008, was astounding. It stated simply that “The department does not hold such an account in recorded form.”

Hmm! From the Department’s contradictory statements we are now left to surmise that either there was no analysis and justification behind their decision not to re-open the Gaul RFI, or that their reasoning has not been ‘set out’ and recorded on any physical media or legible format. It may, therefore, only exist in their heads – in the form of mental images, conceptions, impressions or phantasms. Or, perhaps, it only manifested itself via sensory representations, dispositions, moods or affections.

It is, of course, also possible that the DfT is not telling the truth. But, that would be terribly wicked and unbecoming.

Elastic conclusions and the re-writing of history

In an earlier POST we already mentioned one embellishment contained in a paper produced by the experts in the 2004 Gaul RFI.

In that same paper, drawn up as a summary of the results of the formal investigation, the experts also went a step beyond the official findings and stated with conviction:

“There was no logical reason why the duff and offal chute lids were secured in the open position, whilst dodging, other than crew error. It is also difficult to understand why the flap valves were jammed in the open position other than bad maintenance onboard or ashore.”

The authors were, of course, well aware of the fact that the offal chute lids had not been found secured in the open position. They were also aware that it was only around the duff chute lid that some kind of ‘ligature’ had been seen hanging and, therefore, one could not truthfully say that both the duff and the offal chute lids had been secured open by the crew of the Gaul.

The RFI final report, having been drawn up by better-versed legal minds, went only as far as advising that:

“In the case of the duff chute, the single lid was apparently secured in the open position by some form of ligature and in the case of the offal chute the split lid was found with the forward half open and the aft half closed, but not secured.”

The RFI experts must have also realised that any future interested parties would be more likely to read their free paper rather than the costly and voluminous RFI report, and that their words may therefore be taken as fact.

In the light our previous post and the above observations we would ask our readers the following question: What can one make of these exaggerations, which, it so happened, had the effect of adding undeserved weight to the Court’s ‘crew error’ verdict?

Clues and toggles

In continuation of our post of March 09, we are now publishing a DOCUMENT, which points to some differences and similarities in the ways in which the re-opened formal investigations (RFIs) into two major marine accidents: the MV Derbyshire and FV Gaul have been conducted and the reasons why the first was able to deliver better quality results than the second.

We considered the formal investigation into the loss of the MV Derbyshire, in which, initially, the Assessors wrongly concluded - on the basis of a rope seen emerging from the Bosun’s store hatch opening and of a simple examination of the disposition of that hatch’s toggles - that the loss of the vessel had been due to crew error.

In a curiously similar manner, the Gaul RFI also put the blame for the loss of the trawler on the crew, who, the RFI panel claimed, had neglected to close the inner covers to two openings in the hull - this time on the basis of a ligature apparently holding the vessel’s duff chute inner lid in the open position.

However, as the Derbyshire Assessors’ report had been made public two years prior to the RFI court hearings, their findings were openly examined and contested when appropriate and this allowed the court to arrive, in the end, at a set of different and more robust conclusions.

What is worthy of note here is that, in the Derbyshire RFI, it was the subsequent examination by independent experts of the condition and position of the Bosun’s hatch cover’s toggles that led to the rebuttal of the Assessors’ initial verdict of crew error.
Finally, the court concluded that the crew had not failed to secure the hatch lid and that the rope emerging from the Bosun’s store hatch opening was nothing more than post-casualty debris.

Unfortunately, despite the precedent provided by the Derbyshire inquiry, during the Gaul inquiry no external, independent examination of the case was allowed.
In the Gaul Investigation, the report of the Assessors, the retained experts and the court was presented at the end of the RFI as one final document, ‘set in stone’. Nonetheless, a mere glance at the position of the toggles, as shown by the underwater survey footage, suggests that the inner lids of both chutes on the Gaul had been initially closed.

Surprisingly, during the court hearings, neither the strongback bar (which, in conjunction with two toggles, secured the offal chute cover) nor the condition of the toggles was even mentioned. In addition to and more intriguingly than this oversight is, however, the creative, ‘non-figurative’ manner in which the retained experts produced the drawings of the duff and offal chutes, in their supposedly ‘as found’ condition.

The toggles, which in the underwater survey video footage are clearly shown to be in the ‘hatch closed’ position, appear on the experts’ drawings to be in the ‘hatch open’ position.

The unfortunate effect of these inaccuracies is that it can mislead subsequent examiners into concluding that, since all the toggles were found in the ‘open’ position on the wreck, the court’s finding that the crew had left the hatches open prior to the loss of the vessel is most likely correct.

More about it HERE

Wilful ignorance

When they’ve finished filling in their various questionnaires, the Fraud Squad detectives set about catching criminals.

But, how do they perform this task? Do they go out into the street, copping people at random? No, of course not! They employ logic.

The unfortunate thing, however, is that their logic can sometimes take the shape of the politicised Heads of the Met.

In our previous posts we reported on the progress made by the Fraud Squad in response to our fraud complaint. Today, we are able to provide you with an exciting update:

After 11 months of rumination, the Met detectives were finally able to shout Eureka, as they found an answer to our concerns, and a simple one at that.

In a letter signed by a Detective Chief Inspector of the Fraud Squad, we were informed that the design fault on the Gaul - which, we contended, could have competed as a more likely cause for the loss of the vessel than crew negligence, had evidence of this fault not been withheld – was, in fact, recognised by the 2004 RFI and duly mentioned in the final report, at paras 2.44 –2.49.

How extraordinary! The naval architect, who has been carping about the final report to the RFI and its findings for more than two years now, never realised that the Investigation Panel had in fact agreed with him.

How could he have missed the meaning of those six vital paragraphs, which the Met detectives’ perspicacity identified as proof that the RFI panel didn’t keep shtum about the design fault in question?

Well, the truth of the matter is that the above-mentioned paragraphs[1] refer, in fact, only to:

1. a calculation error in the design of the chutes, the unfortunate significance of which being, nevertheless, overlooked (see DESIGN ERROR 2 document);
2. a mention of the fact that the vessel owners had annotated the drawing of the chute with the statement “the design of the watertight hopper hatch cover was “too fiddly” " – statement endorsed by the final report despite being factually incorrect;
3. the unrealistic notion that the one inch square section of the steel hinge spindles would have become rounded with normal use (while, in the same paragraph, the experts advise that they had visited the Gaul’s 29 year old sister vessel on which, the same type of spindle had not, even by that time, become rounded);
4. a suggestion that the design of the hinges would have “inevitably resulted in corrosion within the brass gland” - in fact the ‘brass gland’ referred to therein was a sintered bronze, self lubricating, bearing, and
5. a statement that the flaps could not be maintained without destroying them, which, as we explained HERE as well as in this POST and on page 22 of the TECHNICAL REPORT, was pure misconception.

Nowhere in the report is it mentioned that the non-return flaps opened the wrong way round (a major DESIGN FAULT) and, therefore, would have failed to act as the principal strength barrier against seawater flooding, as they were supposed to. And that is the crux of the matter. Plain as daylight.

To claim otherwise is brazenly insincere, similar to saying that white is black and black is white.

When questioned about these inadvertences, the DCI professed ignorance of the details of the case, passing the buck to the lowest rank: i.e. a constable in his squad.

(To be continued)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] A copy of paras 2.44 –2.49 is provided at THIS LINK

The rust

In our previous posts of 30 January 2007 and 9 April 2007 (incl. the ADDITIONAL DATA document) as well as our TECHNICAL REPORT etc., we explained in detail why it was unlikely that the non-return flaps of the duff and offal chutes on the Gaul should have both been seized in the open position, due to corrosion, at the time when the vessel was lost.

The hinge assemblies of the non-return flaps contained oilite low-maintenance bearings (oil impregnated sintered bronze), which were designed for the life of the vessel and not just for the 18 months period that was the lifespan of the Gaul.
Furthermore, the extracts from the underwater survey footage presented in our 30 January post showed clearly that, even after 28 years under the sea, other structures on the Gaul, which used the same combination of materials as the flaps’ hinges, worked without problem.

Now, we are adding the statements of two witnesses who had sailed on the Gaul on her previous voyages including the last but one.

Skipper Suddaby, whom we mentioned earlier on this site, tells us in his recently published book, at page 167 that:

“I believe firmly that both chutes were in perfect working order right up to the time that the Gaul was lost” and that: “there is no report of the Gaul crew having trouble dumping the duffs back”.

Also, Mr. Petty, who had been the mate of the Gaul from 18 September 1973 to January 1974, when questioned under oath during the RFI, gave the following answers:

“Q. Can you remember using that hopper on the last trip you were on when you were with Mr. Suddaby?
A. What, the Gaul?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes.
Q. What was its condition at that time, can you remember? Was it working or was --
A. It was all working, yes, everything was working perfect.
Q. Did you ever have any problems with it or did the men have any problems where it seized up and so would not open when they threw duffs on it?
A. Never. That is the gospel truth, never.”
(Transcripts of evidence, day 2 page 46)

The RFI conclusions, however, stated that the non-return flaps of the chutes were seized in the open position when the vessel left Hull on her last voyage (See RFI final report, page 286).If the chutes had been working perfectly well and smoothly during the Gaul’s first four voyages, as the witnesses testified, how could the RFI panel expect the public to believe that they were seized with corrosion when the vessel left Hull at the start of her fifth and last voyage? [1]

The RFI panel of experts and justice Steel should, perhaps, explain to us why they chose to flagrantly ignore all these facts and testimonies and go for the ‘rust theory’, in support of which they had no proper evidence.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] The question of why two separate mechanisms, which had been appropriately engineered for the marine environment, which would have been fully greased and lubricated at the vessel’s delivery, which had different operating cycles and which were operated by two separate teams of ship personnel, should both seize in the fully open position due to corrosion and at approximately the same time, is rather intriguing.
As the RFI panel was informed during the investigation, it is far more likely that the non-return valves shared some fault in their DESIGN, which manifested itself during the severe weather conditions that the vessel encountered prior to its loss.

Inventions and devices

In our previous posts we uncovered a number of inadequacies in the expert analysis carried out during the 2004 Gaul RFI.

More recently, we have highlighted some serious flaws in the RFI analysis pertaining to the Gaul’s sinking scenario.
Yesterday, we raised doubts as to the quality of the information put forward by the RFI panel of experts in their paper: ‘The Loss of the M.F.V Gaul’ which was presented to the Royal Institution of Naval Architects in 2006.

Today, we would like to go back to that same paper and question why a door self-closing mechanism, similar to the one pictured below, was mentioned only in that document, while the 2004 RFI report, the transcripts of evidence or other related sources do not seem to include any reference to such a device.

“8.3(c) Flooding of liver plant

Subsequent to the model testing, it was found although the door from the factory to the liver plant room……………. The door was partially shut by a self-closing device…”

The answer may be quite simple: without such a device, which would have allowed floodwater to become trapped inside the liver plant room (and thus change the stability behaviour of the vessel), the vessel-sinking scenario chosen by the RFI experts would have been less plausible.

Apart from the lack of evidence as to the existence of a self-closer, it is also important to note that the door to the liver plant room on the factory deck was a weathertight door to which - naval architects know it is neither standard shipbuilding practice nor stated norm - self-closing devices are not fitted because they do not work correctly.

Hyperbolic representation

On 25 January 2006, the Gaul RFI experts panel presented a paper entitled ‘The Loss of the M.F.V Gaul’ (see http://www.bctq.com/downloads/Gaul.pdf) to the Royal Institution of Naval Architects. This paper - a summary on the work the experts had concluded during the 2004 RFI - flatly states:

“There was no logical reason why the duff and offal chute lids were secured in the open position, whilst dodging, other than crew error. It is also difficult to understand why the flap valves were jammed in the open position other than bad maintenance onboard or shore.”

Familiar perhaps with the old wisdom that a good slogan can stop fifty years of analysis, or maybe emboldened by the calm passage of time, the Gaul experts claimed in their paper more certainty for the results of the 2004 RFI than the course of the proceedings ever warranted, and confidently put forward a more unequivocal explanation for the open state of the chutes’ inner lids.

Thus, what justice Steel and his associates had delicately implied at the end of the RFI, fourteen months later, the experts laid down in more explicit language, adding extra detail, specificity and emphasis to what the legal staff had left unsaid.

Had our Gaul experts been more scrupulous in checking their notes, the RFI transcripts of evidence and the final report, they would have remembered that the duff and offal chutes’ lids had not actually been found secured in the open position. Though, of course, the implication that the lids had been found so allowed the crew error/negligence label to be much more easily attached.

Obstinacy

“The Department is satisfied that there is no reason to doubt the outcome of the expert analysis that led to the Re-opened Formal Investigations conclusions and consequently there is no reason to re-open the investigation,” 

says the message sent to us by the Department for Transport on 8 October 2007.

Herewith, the DfT are once again proclaiming their faith in the merits of the 2004 Gaul RFI which, it is no longer a secret, did not lead to anything, except injustice and discontent, driving the whole purpose of a formal investigation onto precarious ground.

“You have informed me that the technical report, related documents and information published on the following sites: http://the-trawler-gaul.blogspot.com and www.freewebs.com/inconvenientcitizen, had been viewed by technical experts within the DfT before your latest decision not to re-open the investigation was taken.
I would therefore be grateful if you could tell me who these in-house experts are.”

we inquired gently the very same day.

Well, the DfT have, so far, been unable to give us any reply. They need, it seems, legal advice on how to answer the question.

Why take such precautions? We had only asked for the names of the experts involved… Is it because no in-house technical specialists have been in fact consulted? The DfT draw their technical expertise from agencies such as MCA and MAIB. These, as far as we know, have not yet been requested to advise the Department on any of the technical matters that had been raised... Is it because their advice might not be what the DfT would like to hear?

Anxious and unable to either refute our disclosures or renege the schemes of the previous administration, the DfT is therefore stuck, mindlessly repeating the same old line.

While it may first appear as bizarre, their attitude is quite explicable: the system created by our political regime cannot simply over-ride itself in order to correct the wrongs of that regime.

Inhabitants of a closed system, like the one described by the Michelson and Morley experiment, our government departments and their institutional dependants are, moreover, unable to observe the absolute actions of that system from the outside - trapped as they are within their own relativity, and so much preoccupied with self-preservation.

The hinged inner covers – part 1

Over the course of the past year we have revealed a number of serious failings in the conduct and conclusions drawn by the 2004 Gaul RFI panel. Throughout this time, the DfT has, nonetheless, persistently avoided re-opening the debate on this subject and doggedly stuck to the RFI

As the fallacies in their final report were being dismantled, they continued to fend off any controversy by wielding what they thought was their ‘biggest’ argument:

[Regardless of any failings in the investigative process, on the day of the loss, the crew could have closed and secured the inner covers of the duff and offal chutes and this action in itself would have saved the vessel.]

Thus, the officials argue, regardless of any failures of the RFI, the over-riding outcome of the formal investigation (that crew error had been instrumental in the vessel’s loss) is still valid and, therefore, a miscarriage of justice did not occur.

As we are going to demonstrate in our future posts, this argument, also, is fallacious in that it, too, relies on misinterpretations of known facts and on conclusions that have been drawn from incorrect or unsound premises. For instance:

1. The panel concluded that the crew had left the inner covers of the chutes open. Using images from the underwater survey of wreck, they tried to show that one of the inner covers had been tied back in the open position.
   The ligature that supposedly performed this function was clearly just an item of post-casualty debris.
   Moreover, there was evidence indicating quite the opposite –i.e. that both covers might have been closed and secured before the incident happened.
   
   
2. The panel stated that the construction of the inner covers was satisfactory, that they were watertight and that, had they been closed, the safety of the vessel would have been assured.
   This is not at all correct: the inner covers were neither weathertight nor watertight, they were not even supposed to be so, and, if closed, they could not have been relied upon to maintain the watertight integrity of the vessel.

The chutes had two means of protection against the ingress of water from outside: the outer non-return flaps and the inner covers.

Making a simplistic, although very befitting, analogy we can compare the system for closing the chutes to that used to seal a plastic milk bottle: the threaded plastic cap at the outside, providing the strength barrier against spillage, and the tin foil seal on the inside, meant only to stop leakage.

The Gaul RFI, in their desire to obscure the obvious design flaws of the outer flaps, concluded that, no matter the state of the flaps, had the inner covers been closed and secured, the loss of vessel would have been prevented.
This, going back to our comparison, is like saying that, no matter whether your milk bottle has its plastic cap securely screwed on or not, the tin foil underneath should be enough to prevent the milk from spilling, whatever the circumstances and however roughly you handle the bottle.

The fish loading hatches

In 1999, in the year following their first underwater survey of the wreck of the Gaul, the MAIB produced their Marine Accident Report no. 4/99.
Amongst other things, this report put forward the MAIB’s hypothesis as to why the two large fish loading hatches on the Gaul had been found open during the survey. This stated that, at the time of the loss, the hatches had been unsecured and that they had therefore fallen open during the vessel’s capsize and sinking ’by the stern’.

As we have attempted to demonstrate in the document published at this LINK, the MAIB analysis, taken as read by the 2004 RFI panel, appears to have been seriously flawed.
The error it contains relates to one of the possible mechanisms that could have opened the fish loading hatches, namely, an increase in pressure of the air trapped between the water that was flooding into the vessel and the under side of the closed hatches.The MAIB report stated that the maximum lifting pressure on the underside of the fish loading hatches was only 478 N/m² (49 kg/m²), and that this would occur, for some unknown reason, when the vessel was exactly 80m below the sea surface. (!?)

A simple calculation can show, however, that if the Gaul had had a trim by the head of only 5º [1] and had been submerged to merely two metres below the sea’s surface, the lifting pressure on the underside of each fish-loading hatch could have been of the order of 900 kg/m² (i.e. approximately 3.5 tonnes per hatch), while the self-weight of each hatch was approximately 0.9 tonnes.

This ‘error’ meant that one plausible scenario for the opening of the hatches was incorrectly eliminated from the formal investigation, while another similarly plausible hypothesis – the possibility of the hatches having been opened by the force of internal floodwater acting on the hatches from inside the vessel – was not even mentioned.

Here again, as in the case of the duff and offal chutes, the preferred explanation was crew error.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Although both the MAIB and RFI experts have concluded that the Gaul sank initially and sedately by the stern, this theory cannot be relied upon with any degree of certainty, as it does not take into account the dynamic loads and ship motions that the vessel would undoubtedly have experienced, whilst at or near to the sea’s surface and following the redistribution and loss of buoyancy that would have occurred, as it flooded and sank. At the time of the loss the weather was extreme, with a significant wave height of circa 10m and with infrequent individual waves of up to 19m in height.

Brief statement

Mr Tony Bowman - Managing Director of TMC (Marine Consultants) Ltd was the technical expert appointed by the Attorney General to ensure that all relevant technical evidence was presented to 2004 Re-opened Formal Investigation (RFI) and to provide expert advice on the matters related to the loss of the Gaul.

Today I called Mr Bowman and asked for his opinion on the evidence related to the design defect in the duff and offal chutes on the vessel - evidence that had been produced by the MCA and available to those concerned since 2002.

The TMC Director would offer no comment on the matter other than stating that all he had to say about the design of the Gaul’s chutes was contained in the transcripts of evidence and RFI final report.

Well, we’ve already seen them… That's why I was asking.

RFI experts' report

In our posts of 28 April and 03 May, we reported on the difficulties of obtaining a document held by the Department for Transport (DfT) – the joint report of the experts in the 2004 Formal Investigation into the sinking of the trawler Gaul.

On 26 June 2007, in a letter sent to Sandra Gidley MP in response to her similar request, Dr Stephen Ladyman, Minister for Transport at that time, wrote:

“The report referred to in paragraph 8 of the Expert’s Protocol is not in a form that can be easily reproduced or transmitted in its entirety. I would be happy to send you any relevant excerpt if you could submit a more specific request for information.”

One month later, on 26 July 2007, in a letter on the same topic, the DfT takes a different approach:

“The Department has sought advice from the Treasury Solicitor’s office on the status of the Joint Panel of Experts report and has been advised that it is not a public document. It was referred to at the RFI but only the transcripts of the various experts oral evidence were actually placed on the GAUL website.

Furthermore, it is accepted that the material prepared for the RFI was prepared on behalf of the Attorney so strictly the Joint Report is the property of the Attorney.

However, the Department can see no difficulty in providing your naval architect with an opportunity to view the Panel’s report but he should be advised that it is not a public document and it will be provided only on the basis that it remains confidential and the property of the Attorney.“

Questioned further on this subject, the Head of Shipping Policy in the DfT told us that the report in question was so confidential that no copy or reproduction of its contents or of any part of its contents was permitted.

Why cannot the public view a technical document, which was created in the course of a public investigation that cost the taxpayer about £10 mil? Although the public paid for it, the record is now owned by the Attorney General who would not even release copies of parts of the document for research and public interest purposes.

The experts' protocol

In our post of 17 March, we reported on our attempts to obtain two documents held by the Department for Transport (DfT), which are mentioned in the Gaul RFI EXPERTS' PROTOCOL (paragraphs 3, 8 and 9) and which, frankly, should have been published within the final report (as was the case in the MV Derbyshire RFI).
Having failed to lodge a request for these papers via the parliamentary route, on 19 March, I sent THIS EMAIL to the DfT.

Since then, we have managed to obtain a copy of the first document (i.e. the list of “all” possible scenarios for the loss of the Gaul) from the MAIB. (This list looks quite interesting and we intend to comment on it separately, in due course.)

The second document that we would like to obtain, (i.e. the joint report, which gives details of the RFI experts’ consideration of the various loss scenarios that had been put forward during the investigation), the DfT is still not able to provide.

Chased up on this matter, the head of Shipping Policy 4, not too thrilled to hear from us again, said that the Department was now depleted of staff with intimate knowledge of the Gaul affair, so he had had to refer our request to the Treasury Solicitor. The latter, we were told, is now the only person left at the scene, able to guide the DfT in their search for the document in question.

I hope that the joint report – central piece of the £10m investigation - has not been misplaced or mislaid…

Inconsistencies

On the rare occasions when we managed to get a reaction from them, the UK Marine Accident Investigation Branch claimed, hand on heart, that their investigators role in the Gaul RFI had been limited to the mere provision of the underwater survey video footage and technical drawings. The MAIB did nothing more than “act as agents” “leaving the retained experts in the formal investigation to draw their own conclusions” as to the causes of the accident. This version of events was also backed by Dr Stephen Ladyman, the Transport Minister, in his response to a parliamentary question.

However, Para 3 of the Experts’ Protocol in the Gaul Re-Opened Formal Investigation, which was drawn up in October 2002 and annexed to the 2004 RFI final report, states a rather different thing: “A list of all possible scenarios has previously been drawn up by MAIB in consultation with the families’ experts which should form the basis for further work.”, which, somehow, appears to contradict the MAIB’s non-interference claims.

Anxious to solve this inconsistency, we have requested both the MAIB and the Department for Transport that a copy of this list be made available to us. In reply to our request, the MAIB sent us this email. From DfT we haven’t heard anything yet – nothing, except the sound of steps scurrying away from the torchlight.

Cherry-picking

After a suitable delay, Laurance O’Dea, the Treasury Solicitor, emailed a reply to our oft-repeated enquiry regarding the missing evidence in the Gaul investigation.

In his response, dated 23.02.2007, Mr O’Dea again sought to dispel our concerns about the soundness of the investigation, this time by assuring us that the retained experts in the RFI “were able to consider the various drawings of the vessel, including the arrangements of the duff and offal chutes before the public hearings”, that “these experts had been instructed to make their own judgments on the evidence that they were able to see” and that they were “independent and reached conclusions on the evidence available to them”.

Fair enough, so far, but what we actually wanted to know, though, was whether the evidence available to those experts included any mention of the design fault that the specialists from MCA and MAIB had discussed and agreed upon some time ago. Was this evidence contained in the bundle that ‘they were able to see’? We still haven’t got an answer to this question.

“The evidence presented to the Inquiry, and accepted by the Wreck Commissioner was that the chutes were not secured and that water was able to find its way onto the factory deck” and “there was very strong evidence from the survey that the chutes were open and not secured at the time of the loss” the missive further explains.

Up to this point, we agree with the Treasury Solicitor. But then he goes on to say that “there was no evidence[1] that the chutes had been forced open by wave or water action so this was not advanced as a loss scenario by the experts”

Pardon? But, we have already demonstrated that there was enough evidence, which, in legal terms, is called ‘scientific evidence’ – i.e. deduced from well-recognized scientific principles –that supported this loss scenario.
The fact that the chutes were found open at the time of the underwater survey means just that. It does not tell us when or how they had become open. And it certainly does not reveal that they had been open for some time before the incident[2]

To assume otherwise is simply jumping to conclusions.

We don’t know how the retained experts made their judgements; we fear, however, that the evidence that was placed before them was selected in a way that rather ‘counted the hits and overlooked the misses’.
....................................................................................................

[1] We would also like to point out that there was no concrete evidence to back the RFI’s conclusion that the non-return flaps had seized in the open position due to corrosion. In our post of January 30, we also showed that, in fact, there was evidence to the contrary.
(Note: the RFI relied heavily on the testimony of a former DOT surveyor who had carried out a survey on an older Gaul sister vessel. He had found that the flaps on that vessel were open and stated that they were rustbound and frozen. Had he been questioned further on this issue, the court would have learned that, whilst the flaps may have been found to be open, it was only an assumption on his part that this had been due to corrosion. The hinges that were assumed to have corroded were not in fact visible to the naked eye and, in order to establish whether corrosion had occurred or not, it would have been necessary to dismantle the flap assemblies).

[2] For further details on these issues you can revisit our previous posts and the factor tree diagram.

MAIB

I have been in touch with a senior Maritime Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) source, who had been involved in the preparation of the Gaul case prior to the 2004 formal investigation.

Asked whether the MAIB had provided information to the wreck commissioner (i.e justice David Steel) in respect of the patent design defect in the construction and arrangement of the duff and offal chutes on the Gaul, he would say neither Yes nor No.

As to the pre-investigation deliberations that had taken place between MAIB and other experts on the subject of the faults in the construction of the chutes he had no clear recollection.
Whilst in other cases the MAIB would collect evidence and provide analysis on the causes and circumstances of a marine accident, in the Gaul case, I am told, the MAIB provided the documentary evidence, but left the government’s retained experts to formulate their own conclusions. The MAIB, my interlocutor said, was in a difficult situation vis-á- vis the Gaul case.

I wonder why.

Parliamentary Questions and Answers (I)

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what estimate he has made of the total cost of investigations and inquiries into the loss of the F. V. Gaul in 2006 prices. [96789]

Dr. Ladyman: The total cost to the Department of investigations and inquiries into the loss of the FV Gaul was £6.5 million.

No adjustment has been made for 2006 prices.

Gadfly: Perhaps Dr Ladyman should know that the Original Formal Investigation was concluded in 1974.

There appear to be some items missing from the above list. The total costs to the Department should also have included:

1. the costs of the stability and seakeeping investigations and model tests carried out for the Department by NMI and YARD between 1975 and 1978 estimated at £75,000 (in 1976 prices)

2. the costs of the two reports by Roger Clarke published in 2000. Stated to have cost the Department £50,000 at that time

3. additionally, the costs of 32 years of governmental time that has not been included in the above (political staff, technical, clerical and administrative staff, MOD, legal etc) - £1m at todays prices would not be an unreasonable evaluation!

If a simple compound interest calculation is carried out on the costs detailed above, using historical Bank Rate indices, then a figure of £10m at 2006 prices is obtained!

See also: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/columnists/columnists.html?in_article_id=371759&in_page_id=1772&in_author_id=244

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what progress has been made towards the implementation of the formal safety recommendations arising from the F. V. Gaul Re-opened Formal Investigation. [96790]

Dr. Ladyman: It is considered that, as far as is reasonably practicable, the recommendations have been implemented.

Gadfly: The four formal safety recommendations have not been implemented.

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether any evidence of a design fault in the construction and arrangement of the duff and offal chutes on the trawler F. V. Gaul was made available to the Wreck Commissioner during the 2004 investigation. [96794]

Dr. Ladyman: The Marine Accident Investigation Branch provided the inquiry with a copy of a full set of technical drawings for the vessel, a number of which detailed the design of these chutes. These drawings were reviewed by the technical experts and the expert representing the Department for Transport referred to these drawings in the production of the document “Notes on the duff and offal chutes”, submitted to the Re-opened Formal Investigation. These notes included comments on the design of the chutes and the potential design inadequacies.

Gadfly: First of all, the question that had been asked was not answered (i.e. was any evidence of a design fault made available to the Wreck Commissioner?). A yes or no answer would have sufficed.
Secondly, The Marine Accident Investigation Branch would provide, as they normally do and as the Treasury Solicitor recently confessed, “considerable assistance” to the Wreck Commissioner. They would therefore provide much more than a set of old drawings.
Thirdly, the “Notes on the duff and offal chutes”, only commented on a presumed design deficiency in relation to the difficulty of maintenance of the non-return flaps.So, in a couple of sentences, Dr Ladyman implies that either the MAIB performance was poor, or the MAIB witheld evidence, or the retained experts were unable to recognize an obvious design fault in the construction and arrangement of the duff and offal chutes.

Not so sure...

The other day I asked another retained expert the same question: did he identify or see any reference to a design fault, in terms of inadequate strength of the inner covers and possible malfunction of the non-return flaps on the Gaul, within the documentation that had been made available to him during the formal investigation?

He seemed hesitant and unsure about that...

Taking refuge in ambiguity

In a recent message, the Treasury Solicitor writes: 

“You have indicated that in your view the chutes were a design fault. This is your view but appears not to have been accepted as such by any of the retained experts.”

Having contacted one of the retained experts, I learned that the design fault they had considered was in fact related to the difficulty of maintenance of the non-return flaps (2) (3), and that they had not identified or even seen, within the documentation that had been made available to them, any reference to a design fault in terms of inadequate strength of the inner covers and possible malfunction of the non-return flaps.

There is definitely a difference in perception here. Could some occlusion of the communication lines between those involved in the 2004 investigation be the explanation for that?

Anyway, that the vessel had a design fault in the construction and arrangement of the duff and offal chutes is an engineering fact (see the technical report on our website).

Why this has not also become a legal fact, is something that should be explained – plainly and without procrastination.

_____________________________________________________

(2) Concluding remarks from Mr Meeson (Investigation transcript) suggesting answers to the formal questions:
“………Although the design of the non-return flap was deficient, in that it was liable to seize over time and had no real means whereby it could be maintained, proper use……..”
(3) This was also questioned in the technical report published on our website: http://www.freewebs.com/inconvenientcitizen/fulltechnicalreportpdf.htm.