The design of a ship that sank in a collision with a ferry off Lamma Island in 2012 met the safety standards of the time, a Hong Kong inquest has found, rejecting accusations by relatives of the 39 deceased victims that it was flawed and contributed materially to the city’s worst maritime disaster in decades.
The Coroner’s Court on Wednesday returned a verdict of unlawful killing of the 39, pointing to gross negligence by the ships’ two coxswains, while ruling on issues relating to the circumstances of the crash.
Coroner Monica Chow Wai-choo ruled that the omission of a watertight door on the underdeck of the sunken Lamma IV was deliberate and compliant with regulatory requirements when the vessel was built in 1994 and 1995.
The victims’ relatives have argued the absence of a watertight door was the main reason for the ship’s rapid sinking and the tragic loss of lives on October 1, 2012, citing marine experts’ unanimous opinion that the door would have allowed the ship to stay afloat until rescuers arrived.
But Chow accepted explanations from the vessel’s designers that a door was never intended from the start.
Chow said the Lamma IV was built in such a way that it would stay afloat if one below-deck compartment was compromised, meeting the minimum standard for vessels sailing in Hong Kong’s sheltered waters at the time.
The fact that it did not adopt stronger safety features did not mean the design was inherently unsafe, she added.
“The omission of a watertight door ... reflected a rational design decision taken in accordance with the understanding and application of [regulatory requirements] at the time,” Chow said.
“The fact that the 2012 collision resulted in flooding of more than one compartment does not justify a retrospective reassessment of that decision by reference to a standard that was not required at the time.”
She added: “A design choice made in 1994 in compliance with the regulatory requirement is not undermined by a later casualty resulting in damage of a kind which the regulation did not require the vessel to withstand.”
Some of the victims’ relatives voiced their frustration after the hearing, calling the court’s findings “utterly disappointing” and “unbelievable”.
Alice Leung Shuk-ling, who lost her younger brother, said the court appeared to suggest that nobody involved in the Lamma IV’s design and construction should be held responsible for the tragedy, even as the inquest had uncovered numerous human mistakes in those procedures.
“My mind’s gone blank. It’s too much of a shock to me,” she said.
Ryan Tsui Chi-shing, whose elder brother and nephew died in the disaster, asked rhetorically whether relatives should be rewarded for giving maritime authorities an opportunity to review their regulatory regime.
The Lamma IV was struck by the catamaran Sea Smooth while carrying 124 HK Electric employees and their relatives to watch National Day fireworks over Victoria Harbour.
The Lamma-bound Sea Smooth, operated by Hong Kong and Kowloon Ferry, was able to continue its journey, but the Lamma IV sank within minutes, leaving many passengers unable to don life jackets before being thrown overboard.
The Sea Smooth’s coxswain, Lai Sai-ming, was jailed for eight years for manslaughter and endangering the safety of others at sea. Chow Chi-wai, who was at the helm of the Lamma IV, received nine months for the latter offence.
The 44-day inquest was held in May last year after two relatives of the victims convinced the Court of Appeal that it was in the public interest to conduct another probe into aspects not covered in a government-led hearing in 2013 and subsequent criminal proceedings.
Opening her 4½-hour speech on Wednesday, Chow read out the names of the 39 deceased before ruling that the crash was due to the gross negligence of the two coxswains.
She found the 39 were killed unlawfully, reaching the same conclusion as the Coroner’s Court in 2020, when it decided against commencing an inquest on the basis that findings made in the previous hearings were comprehensive enough.
Regarding the credibility of witnesses, Chow rejected accusations by the Marine Department and the next of kin that Ken Lo Ngok-yang, a director of Cheoy Lee Shipyards, had been dishonest about the omission of the watertight door to protect his company’s reputation.
She said Lo had no motive to lie because all claims for damages had been settled long before the inquest.
Lo had insisted the decision not to install the door was deliberate and described the so-called “0.1L rule”, which governs the calculation of a vessel’s ability to stay afloat when damaged, as a legal requirement on the minimum size of underdeck rooms.
Chow said the director’s explanation was “not technically accurate”, but it nonetheless reflected his consistent understanding of the rule’s practical consequence in a vessel’s design.
Chow further ruled that any indication in the Lamma IV’s drawings that a watertight door should be installed was a “drafting error” that had been left unnoticed until the collision.
The coroner will continue explaining her findings on other aspects covered in the inquest when the hearing resumes on Thursday.
The government attached great importance to the incident and would continue to review the relevant judgment as the court was still in the course of delivering its verdict, a spokesman said.
He added that the Marine Department had implemented feasible suggestions from various investigation reports to enhance safety and prevent similar incidents from happening again.
-- SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
