A MAN facing a triple-manslaughter charge following a collision at sea has admitted that action could have been taken sooner that may have prevented the fatal incident.
Lewis Carr, the officer in charge on the bridge of the Commodore Goodwill at the time it collided with fishing trawler L’Ecume II in December 2022, acknowledged during cross-examination that mistakes had been made and rules breached.
Mr Carr (30) and his colleague Artur Sevash-Zade (35) each deny three charges of manslaughter in relation to the incident, which resulted in the deaths of L’Ecume II’s three crew members – captain Michael Michieli, Larry Simyunn and Jervis Baligat.
Giving evidence on the 12th day of a trial expected to last four weeks, Mr Carr was asked by Crown Advocate Matthew Maletroit, prosecuting, whether “human error” had played a part in what occurred on the morning of 8 December 2022.
Although he agreed that human error had been a factor “in general”, Mr Carr said the crew of L’Ecume II had been partly responsible in not displaying fishing lights, having no effective lookout and in altering the trawler’s course in a port direction during the final minutes, which he said was in breach of three areas of international regulations designed to prevent collisions.
Admitting that “things could have been done better” from the Goodwill side, and pressed to elaborate on this by Commissioner Sir John Saunders, presiding, Mr Carr said that the potential for a collision with L’Ecume II could have been spotted earlier, and that had this happened action could have been taken to prevent the collision.
Crown Advocate Maletroit said that as the officer in charge, Mr Carr’s primary duty had been to ensure that the freight vessel made the journey from Guernsey to Jersey safely, and asked him whether he had failed to fulfil this responsibility.
After reflecting on the question for a moment, Mr Carr agreed this had been a failing.
The court heard that Maritime and Coastguard Agency rules stated that it was considered “dangerous and irresponsible” for an officer to be on sole watch during periods of darkness, a situation that had arisen on the Goodwill when Mr Carr suggested to Mr Sevash-Zade that he take a meal-break shortly after 5am.
Mr Carr said that in cases when a ship was running late, the watchman would be asked to help work on the vehicle deck in order to speed up the disembarkation process, and therefore would take their meal-break earlier in order to be available for this work. On the day in question, the Goodwill had left St Peter Port 36 minutes late.
“There was commercial pressure from the shore to encourage us to let the watchman have breakfast so that he could help [on the deck] after docking,” Mr Carr said.
Asked whether this was company policy, Mr Carr added: “It wasn’t policy, it was a practice that crept in when the ship was late.”
The jury also heard that Condor’s rules required its vessels to remain at least one nautical mile away from other ships in order to mitigate risk.
Crown Advocate Maletroit asked Mr Carr if he had failed to comply with this rule, however Mr Carr said this was not always possible, particularly in coastal waters.
It was also stated by the Crown Advocate that at the time of a routine call to Jersey’s Coastguard to confirm the Goodwill’s approach to St Helier, the ship’s radar had shown a flashing red warning about the potential for a collision with L’Ecume.
Evasive action could have been taken at that stage, he said, but instead Mr Carr had “allowed Goodwill to steam ahead into a potentially risky situation”.
