Maritime Safety: The Human Factors

The sea can be a very dangerous place – and, given the increasing number and size of ships sailing today, the topic of maritime safety could not be more relevant. Safety at sea has many faces, from the personal drama of airlifting an injured crew-member from a channel ferry to the catastrophic environmental after-effects of major disasters such as the oil spill from the Exxon Valdez in Alaska. Knowledge and training must always be the keys to better safety standards.

Maritime operations and management are now more technical, and more regulated, than ever before, but is it possible to develop an over-arching ‘safety culture’ that can be applied in a fragmented, global industry where crews are often multi-national? Can the psychology of behaviour and attitudes tell us anything useful about how to design more effective, cross-cultural safety training? In a careful study involving interviews with professionals at all levels in the maritime world, Sean Trafford examines this question with an emphasis on the central contribution of human behaviour. The result is not just an interesting piece of academic research, but a practical handbook for anyone concerned with developing safety management systems in a maritime setting.