The report of incidents and accidents for the year ending 31 December 2019 (written by the Boat Safety Scheme) is now available to any interested parties. If you require any further information or access to the report, please request this via chairman@theboatingassociation.co.uk
We wish to highlight incidents regarding fire and CO in the belief this may lead you to reconsider your boat and its use, thus becoming safer.
Out of a total of 196 reported incidents on inland and coastal waterways, there was 72 Fire/explosion (including ‘immediate risk of’) incidents and 7 CO (including near incidents) reported. Whilst this is not a huge number, the CO incidents are reported as ‘major injuries’, that is those requiring hospitalisation. In addition to the above numbers, there are potentially 2 further people affected. At the time of this report, an initial inquest hearing has raised the possibility that 2 people died from CO poisoning on an inland waterway. We are awaiting confirmation of the likely source of the CO at the inquest.
10 Fire incidents were recorded as being caused by electrical issues, a mix of low voltage DC current and mains voltage AC current. Unfortunately, incident reporting is not always completed or accurate during the year, for example, there were 12 fire or CO incidents reported without a cause being determined.
As the Boat Safety Scheme is risk-based data gathered is used to plan future concentration of effort and focus. Examples of this use are the recent introduction of compulsory CO alarms and fire alarms.
Thanks for reading,
BSS Officer
