ALERT — ISSUE 35 — ERGONOMICS AND MAINTAINABILITY

Another issue of the Human Element bulletin, this one is devoted to the ergonomics and maintainability. Note that subject matter has already been partly addressed in the previous issues of Alert, such as the Issue 3 - Ergonomics and Issue 7- Design and Usability.

Making the vessel and the systems on board ergonomic is making them fit for the crew members operating them rather than fitting people to the vessel and the systems, which, unfortunately, is often the case. The accidents occurring at sea commonly manifest themselves in many different ways, for example lack of attention, operator error, or poor ergonomics.

Should insufficient attention be paid to the maintainability during the design of the ship and systems, this can eventually result in such issues as slips, trips and falls (addressed in the Issue 17) and many other problems. The risks stated above can be mitigated through the human-centered design of the vessel since well-designed one will meet all needs of the operator and will be easy to use and maintain; what is the most important, it will be reliable. have a look in this issue of Alert to have better understanding of how important the maintainability and ergonomics are.