SAR convention

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Maritime search and rescue

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It has been suggested that this article be merged into Air-sea rescue. (Discuss) Proposed since October 2018.

A Canadian Forces CH-149 Cormoranthelicopter hoists a man from a Canadian Coast Guard cutter

A SAR cruiser of the German Maritime Search and Rescue Service

Maritime search and rescue refers to the search and rescue for people who are lost at sea. This includes the sailors and passengers from a distressed vessel, as well as survivors of downed aircraft.

Lifeboats are commonly deployed at the coast in order to carry out the rescues (the word lifeboat may also refer to the escape boats on ships). In some cases, an air-sea rescue may be employed, with aircraft (such as flying boats, floatplanes, amphibious helicopters and non-amphibious helicopters equipped with hoists) working with surface vessels.^[1]

Countries with a coastline will have agencies for carrying out maritime search and rescue within their territorial waters. The agency that does this varies by country; it may be the coast guard, a volunteer rescue agency or a subdivision of the navy. When a search is required in international waters, it may involve the agencies of multiple countries.

Contents

• 1History
• 2International divisions of search and rescue responsibility
  • 2.1United Nations
  • 2.2International waters
    • 2.2.1International casualty inquiries
• 3Agencies by country
• 4References

History[edit]

The first lifeboat station in the United Kingdom was at Formby beach, established in 1776 by William Hutchinson, Dock Master for the Liverpool Common Council.^[2]

One of the first organized agencies for carrying out sea rescues was the National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck, founded in 1824, which was later renamed the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. The formation of the agency was spearheaded by Sir William Hillary, who had moved to the Isle of Man and become aware of the dangers of the Irish Sea, with many ships being wrecked around the Manx coast. One of the agency's first notable rescues was the 1830 rescue of the packet St George, which had foundered on Conister Rock at the entrance to Douglas Harbour. Hilary himself commanded the lifeboat and was washed overboard with others of the lifeboat crew, yet finally everyone aboard the St George was rescued with no loss of life.^[3][4]

In late 1824, two lifeboat societies were founded in the Netherlands, which have since been merged into the Royal Netherlands Sea Rescue Institution. The United States Life Saving Service (USLSS) was established in 1848. This was a United States government agency that grew out of private and local humanitarian efforts to save the lives of shipwrecked mariners and passengers. The USLSS later merged with the Revenue Cutter Service to form the United States Coast Guard (USCG). Similar societies were founded in other countries, including the German Maritime Search and Rescue Service (1865), the Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue (1891) and the Swedish Sea Rescue Society (1907).

Early lifeboats were powered by rowing or sail. They were built to many varying designs, and many were unsuitable. An 1851 Admiralty survey of British lifeboats found that 21 out of 100 were unfit for use, and only 55 were in a good state of repair.^[5] A key development was James Beeching's invention of the "self-righting lifeboat".^[6] His safer design quickly became widely used by the RNLI.^[7]

Starting in the 1890s, motorized lifeboats began to enter use. By 1909, the USLSS had 44 lifeboats that had been fitted with engines whose power had increased to 40 hp (30 kW). Motorization allowed lifeboats to travel faster, serve a wider area and be operated by a smaller crew.

Another key development around this time was aircraft. Seaplanes were used for rescue operations as early as the 1910s. Many of the earliest recorded air-sea rescues were carried out by pilots on their own initiative. On example was the United States Navy Reserve pilot Ensign Charles Hammann who, during the Adriatic Campaign, rescued a fellow aviator adrift in the Adriatic Sea by landing on the water in his seaplane.^[8]

The invention of the helicopter made the use of aircraft in sea rescues far more viable. The United States Coast Guard (USCG) was the first agency to try out helicopters in sea rescues, beginning in 1938.^[9] Two early Sikorsky R-4s were acquired in 1941, and training was initiated at Coast Guard Station Brooklyn in New York.^[9] In 1942, Royal Air Force and Royal Navy fliers trained in Brooklyn after which the British bought a large number of "hoverflies" from Sikorsky to re-organize 705 Naval Air Squadron.^[9] The first hoist lift rescue occurred on November 29, 1945, when a barge ran aground at Penfield Reef, off Fairfield, Connecticut, during heavy weather, very near to the Sikorsky facility in Bridgeport. Sikorsky chief pilot Jimmy Viner, along with USAAF Captain Jack Beighle flew a Sikorsky R-5 (S-48) to lift the two crew members using the hoist and deposit them safely ashore.^[10] The first military helicopter air-sea rescue was carried out in 1946 when a Sikorsky S-51 being demonstrated to the U.S. Navy was used in an emergency to pull a downed Navy pilot from the ocean.^[11]

A later development was the introduction of the inflatable boat and rigid-hulled inflatable boat, with the latter first being first commercially available in 1967.^[12][13]

International divisions of search and rescue responsibility[edit]

United Nations[edit]

High seas highlighted in dark blue.

The Geneva Convention on the High Seas, aka UNCLOS I, is an international treaty created in 1958 to codify the rules of international law relating to the high seas, otherwise known as international waters, and is one of four treaties created at the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. This treaty contains the definition of high seas, at Article 1.

International Search and Rescue Advisory Group (INSARAG) is a UN organization that promotes the exchange of information between national urban search and rescue organizations.

International waters[edit]

International waters are divided by the IMO's Maritime Safety Committee into 13 regions as an addendum to the SOLASconvention;^[14] these regions were subdivided by various later conventions.^[15] The International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue^[16][17] was signed in 1979, entered into force in July 1985, and governs SAR operations to present day.^[14] In the Arctic, SAR responsibilities are since May 2011 governed by the Arctic Search and Rescue Agreement.

The duty to render assistance is covered by Article 98 of the UNCLOS:^[18]

Every State shall require the master of a ship flying its flag, in so far as he can do so without serious danger to the ship, the crew or the passengers:

• to render assistance to any person found at sea in danger of being lost;
• to proceed with all possible speed to the rescue of persons in distress, if informed of their need of assistance, in so far as such action may reasonably be expected of him;
• after a collision, to render assistance to the other ship, its crew and its passengers and, where possible, to inform the other ship of the name of his own ship, its port of registry and the nearest port at which it will call.

A ship should not be subject to undue delay, financial burden or other related difficulties after assisting persons at sea; therefore coastal States should relieve the ship as soon as practicable.^[19]

International casualty inquiries[edit]

The Load Lines Convention requires the investigation of casualties, and, under SOLAS regulation I/21 and MARPOL articles 8 and 12, each Administration undertakes, "when it judges" that such an investigation may assist in determining what changes in the present regulations might be desirable:^[20][21]

• to conduct an investigation into any casualty occurring to ships under its flag subject to those conventions, and
• to supply the Organization with pertinent information concerning the findings of such investigations.

Under Article 94 of the UNCLOS, paragraph 7 on Duties of one flag state with respect to another, reads as follows:^[20]

Each State shall cause an inquiry to be held by or before a suitably qualified person or persons into every marine casualty or incident of navigation on the high seas involving a ship flying its flag and causing loss of life or serious injury to nationals of another State or serious damage to ships or installations of another State or to the marine environment. The flag State and the other State shall co-operate in the conduct of any inquiry held by that other State into any such marine casualty or incident of navigation.

International Maritime Organization (IMO) Resolution MSC.255(84), of 16 May 2008, adopts the Code of the International Standards and Recommended Practices for a Safety Investigation into a Marine Casualty or Marine Incident. It is also known as the Casualty Investigation Code. It is meant to govern collaborative investigations into "very serious casualties", which are defined at paragraph 2.22 as "a marine casualty involving the total loss of the ship or a death or severe damage to the environment".^[22]

Agencies by country[edit]

State	Agency of contact	Contact number
Canada	Canadian Coast Guard
United Kingdom	Her Majesty's Coastguard	999
United States	United States Coast Guard

References[edit]

1. ^ Algeo, John. Fifty years among the new words: a dictionary of neologisms, 1941–1991, pp. 39, 106–107. Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0-521-44971-5
2. ^ Yorke, Barbara & Reginald. Britain's First Lifeboat Station, Formby, 1776–1918. Alt Press. ISBN 0-9508155-0-0 also see Liverpool's National Maritime Museum Exhibition and Archives
3. ^ Henning Trüper (2015). Historical Teleologies in the Modern World. Bloomsbury. ISBN 978-1-4742-2108-5. Retrieved 7 May 2016.
4. ^ "The RNLI". Isle of Man Government. Archived from the original on 2 March 2012. Retrieved 4 April 2016.
5. ^ Gilmore, John. Storm warriors: or, Life-boat work on the Goodwin Sands p. 32 ff.
6. ^ Lewis, Richard. History of the Life-Boat, and Its Work (MacMillan & Co., 1874) pp. 27-38.
7. ^ The Lifeboat, Journal of the National Life-boat Institution, volume 5 (1865) p. 153.
8. ^ La Grande Guerra. The Italian Front, 1915–1918. Notable Aviators of the Italian Front. Retrieved on September 8, 2009.
9. ^ Jump up to:^a b c Evans, 2003, p. 181.
10. ^ "Sikorsky Products History, Civilian Rescue". Sikorsky Archives. Retrieved September 7, 2018.
11. ^ McGowan, 2005, p. 65.
12. ^ "RIB HISTORY : boats : ribs : fast rigid hull inflatable power boats : inflatables : hotribs".
13. ^ Dag Pike, The History and future development of RIB's RINA June 2005,
14. ^ Jump up to:^a b imo.org: "International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue (SAR)", retrieved 31 May 2014
15. ^ See the map provided by the IMO ocean atlas Archived November 20, 2012, at the Wayback Machine
16. ^ treaties.un.org: Vol. 1405, 1-23489 - "International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue, 1979" Archived March 4, 2016, at the Wayback Machine, retrieved 31 May 2014
17. ^ 1979 International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue - Adopted in Hamburg, Germany on 27 April 1979" Archived March 4, 2016, at the Wayback Machine, retrieved 31 May 2014
18. ^ unhcr.se (December 2011). "UNHCR: RESCUE AT SEA, STOWAWAYS AND MARITIME INTERCEPTION, Selected Reference Materials 2nd Edition" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 June 2014. Retrieved 31 May 2014.
19. ^ unhcr.org: "Legal Brief on International Law and Rescue at Sea" ArchivedOctober 3, 2014, at the Wayback Machine, retrieved 31 May 2014
20. ^ Jump up to:^a b imo.org: "Casualties", retrieved 31 May 2014
21. ^ imo.org: "Applicable IMO instruments on casualty matters", retrieved 31 May 2014
22. ^ "RESOLUTION MSC.255(84)" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 1 March 2012. Retrieved 3 October 2012.

Categories: 

• Sea rescue