Why captains go down with the ship

All people aboard the Oceanos were eventually rescued. In , the captain of a Greek ferry, the Express Samina, which sank killing more than 60 people, was accused of failing to help passengers flee the sinking vessel. A court will ultimately decide whether the captain of the Costa Concordia broke the law by leaving the ship when he did, but he certainly seems to have acted contrary to many people's ideas of how a captain should behave.

Dr Laura Rowe, a historian at the University of Exeter who specialises in naval history, says the expectation that a ship's captain would stay on board until everyone has been evacuated developed in the midth Century. Captains are fully expected to be the last one off, if not to go down with the ship.

They are known as the 'father of the ship'," she says. This relationship was necessary to help enforce discipline, she says. When is it acceptable for a captain to leave a sinking ship? Had there been enough life rafts, the Titanic's Captain Smith may well have eventually abandoned his ship after all the passengers have been safely evacuated. As long as your own life is not at risk and there are passengers on board, there is a strong moral obligation to stay," he says.

As such, he says, it could prompt international regulators to re-assess the need for more precise rules. Image source, AFP. Ultimate authority. Image source, Reuters. After Captain Ryusaku Yanagimoto gave the order to abandon the burning ship, it was discovered that he had remained aboard. He watched with the other survivors as the Soryu sank along with the bodies of , including her captain. On Feb. Gilmore, who gave the order to clear the bridge. Two Americans were shot dead while Gilmore and two others were wounded — and time to save the crippled sub was running short.

His executive officer closed the hatch and submerged the USS Growler to safety. Commander Gilmore posthumously received the Medal of Honor:. Boldly striking at the enemy in spite of continuous hostile air and anti-submarine patrols, Comdr. A sunken ship is a ship immersed in water as far as it can go. That means it has gone underwater and hit the bottom. This can happen in shallow water or the open ocean. Instead, the boat could have become unbalanced and rolled to its side or flipped right over.

The order to abandon the ship is reasonable. However, it is not fully immersed in water and on the bottom yet. This is one of the tricky ways that this tradition has real world implications. No one can state a captain has to die with a ship.

Just imagine trying to make that a law. That does have real and legal implications. The owners of the cargo on a ship have certain expectations. They are, however, in charge. Not the same as any passenger or crew member can. That would be just as counterproductive as the captain abandoning ship. A cowardly captain is about as useless as a dead one in these terms. Instead, a captain would have been expected to be responsible for the vessel and its crew.

Once the ship has sunk, the cargo would still be intact. At least some of it would be. The ship is now salvage. The captain has a duty to protect that for whoever put him in charge. A sunken ship was subject to any number of pirates or salvage hunters.

So a captain needs to know where the ship sank. For all of this to work, the captain should be the last person to leave a vessel. They need to ensure the lives of everyone on board are being taken into consideration. So the captain helps everyone abandon the ship and then does whatever he or she can after to aid in salvage. Obviously not every ship is sinking as a smooth operation.

And sometimes the captain does, in fact, go down with the ship. Most people know that Captain Smith of the Titanic perished when that ship sank. He famously did not abandon his post as the ship went down. There are some eye witness reports that say Smith was a hero on the Titanic. He spent his time trying to keep passengers calm and helping them get to lifeboats and to safety.

Other stories say he bungled the entire operation. Whatever the truth may have been, Smith was one of the over 1, people who died when the Titanic sank. He did not abandon the ship and held true to the maritime tradition. In , the Costa Concordia capsized near Italy and made international news.

Images of the vessel on its side in shallow water were seen around the world. Captain Francesco Schettino also made news and not for a good reason. As passengers and crew attempted to get to safety, the Captain found his own way off the boat.

Now this disaster was not on the scale of the Titanic. In fact, 32 people died as a result of the ship going down. For the captain to leave while people were still in peril was seen as a clear dereliction of his duty by many. Three years later, Schettino was sentenced to 16 years in prison for his role in the incident. That was for crimes including manslaughter.

It also included abandoning a ship with passengers still onboard. One year of his 16 year sentence was specifically for the crime of abandoning ship. It headed out en route to Jeju. The trip was miles and would take over 13 hours. There were over passengers on board, including high school students on a field trip. The boat had been purchased from Japan and was already 18 years old and in poor condition.

It was retrofitted illegally in Korea to include more space for passengers and cargo. Its gross tonnage was changed from just tons to a staggering 6, tons. Passenger capacity increased from to The ship was known to be imbalanced with a shifted center of gravity. However, documents were falsified to allow it to be certified as safe.

On the morning that the Sewol sank, a fog warning had been issued. The boat was issued a maximum cargo allowance of tons. It was carrying tons. They had not even adjusted the ballast from the previous voyage. Captain Lee Joon-Seok was a replacement captain working on a one-year contract.

The previous captain had complained that the vessel needed repairs. They spent it on a paper certificate. It was around 9 in the morning when the Sewol sank. They were passing through a channel when the ferry started listing starboard. The pilot made note that the steering was not responding. Attempts to compensate made it worse and the cargo rapidly shifted.

That shift caused the boat to dip and take on water. Power cut off, and the boat continued listing. A call went out over the intercom, telling passengers to remain where they were. Even as passenger quarters started filling with water, the warning was broadcast again. And then Captain Joon-Seok did the unthinkable. He personally told passengers to stay where they were. And then he abandoned ship. The first emergency call did not come from the captain or crew.

One of the high school students called for help. Three minutes later the crew called for help. Even as the boat sank, it was local fishing ships that arrived to save the fleeing passengers.

It was over a half hour later that the captain gave the order for passengers to abandon the ship. No one knows if that order was ever relayed to any passengers. It took two-and-a-half hours for the ferry to sink. Despite that, passengers died, including of the students. The captain was the first person to be rescued, along with several crew members.

South Korean law states a captain must remain onboard in a disaster. He was punished accordingly. His actions would have been abhorrent if he had just jumped ship. Instead, he made people stay where they were. The children who stayed were listening to an authority figure. Many of them never even left their rooms. They would have been trapped until it was too late to do anything. The captain was sentenced to 36 years for negligence.

At the time he was acquitted of homicide charges. Later, an appellate court reinstated the homicide verdict and he was given life in prison. A naval captain has different responsibilities than a civilian.

This would be on the same level as desertion and warrant official charges. This includes a court martial and likely a dishonorable discharge. There are exceptions, of course. If a captain were to abandon the ship as part of a greater plan to save the vessel, then that would be reasonable.

Some captains have gone above and beyond to save the crew. One of the most incredible comes from the Second World War. The submarine was on the surface when it came under fire.

Gilmore and several others were shot. Critically injured, he stayed on deck and gave the order to submerge. The crew closed the hatch, and the submarine dived.