 The TRA, standing for the Task Risk Assessment, is one of the fundamental legal requirements aimed to reduce the probability of the work accidents. This approach has been commonly established in the maritime and offshore industry with the objective to improve the human safety standards on board ships and offshore installations. The present guidebook will provide readers with the professional advice on the risk assessment.
The authors tried to give their advice to enable readers to assess their current safety systems against the provisions contained in this guide, and help them with identifying the improvements to be made. In addition, the information provided in the pages of this compact volume, can be used as a basis when developing a completely new TRA system following the best industry practice, and will also be helpful when referred to during the implementation of the system and its application.
The readers will find valuable information on the different roles and responsibilities of the people involves, and their competencies that are required. Of course, the adoption of the TRA approach will eventually result in better risk awareness by people engaged in the task and reduce the number of incidents. It is a good supplementary tool and reading for those seriously concerned about safety.
 This training program developed by Videotel is intended to convey the essential training messages relating to the survival at sea and is aimed at the crew members of both cargo and passenger vessels. The book is covering the whole process of abandoning the vessel, starting from the moment when the general alarm has sounded and through the whole procedure of human rescue by either rescue boat or chopper.
There are four parts in the series, addressing the mustering, shipboard liferafts and lifeboats and, finally, survival and rescue. It should be noted, however, that even though this program underlines the critical importance of good preparation and thorough familiarization with all shipboard lifesaving arrangements and established procedures, it does not cover the drills and exercises that shall be periodically conducted; nor it addresses the technical maintenance of the relevant equipment.
The main focus has been made by the authors on what exactly and how the crew members shall do in case of emergency in order to maximize their chances for survival. Make sure you use the accompanying videos for the Mustering, Liferafts, Lifeboats, and Survival & Rescue. When used altogether, the training pack will provide an excellent introduction to the survival techniques.
 As we all know, transferring personnel from one ship to another or from the ship to the offshore platform and back is one of the integral parts of the offshore work. Such transfer can be accomplished in many different ways. The present publication by Videotel, supplemented with an excellent video, will concentrate on the method of transfer using the transfer baskets. This method has proven safe and effective; however, in order to complete the transfer safely, you will need to understand the basics of the process and familiarize yourself with the safety precautions and procedures to be followed.
The contents of the booklet is arranged in several chapters covering the roles and responsibilities of all parties involved in the transfer process, the equipment used for the transfer including the parts, preparation to be made prior to the commencement of any transfer operation, procedures developed for the safe transfer, and checklist that are normally used to evaluate the preparedness of the personnel and operators for the transfer. The ship to ship transfer using basket is actually considered more hazardous due to the both vessels moving in relation on to another and this would require even more attention to be paid to the safety side of the process.
 As we know, there are two Cods introduced by the IMO as a result of so many maritime accidents including shipboard casualties and marine pollution prevention, namely ISM Code and STCW Code. Their timely introduction to the shipping industry was aimed to focus the attention of all people involved to the critical importance of the safety standards. In this book, the authors have addressed the maritime safety through proper and thorough examination of the human factors.
Note that is not prepared to be a sort of purely academic reference book even though some academic arguments addressing the behavioral safety are included. We would rather say that this book will be great when applied as a practitioner’s book containing useful texts that would be interesting for all people working on board as well as to the supporting personnel ashore and operating companies.
All maritime professionals duly caring about the safety of life at sea and prevention of the marine environment pollution will definitely find the content of this publication useful. Starting with the brief historical background, then author has proceeded to literally all important aspects of the maritime safety making the book an absolutely excellent volume with a truly remarkable coverage of the topics.
 Unfortunately, maritime casualties occur on a regular basis and they have serious ramifications all around the planet. And this takes place even though the ships of today are equipped with the anti-collision technologies and modern navigational equipment to prevent such cases.
The present publication was prepared by the recognized expert and every effort was made by the author to illustrate that the causes for these casualties are not limited to the malfunctioning shipboard navigational equipment and that they are often caused due to the human error.
In addition, the content of the book demonstrates the necessity of proper planning ahead. Among other reasons there are also non cross-checking of the ship’s position information with the relevant systems and too much of reliance to the sophisticated state of the art electronic technologies and information provided by them.
Plus, the apathy arising from the hours and hours of uneventful and boring watchstanding is also considered one of the factors contributing into the possibility for the casualty to occur. We recommend the publication to all those interested in the provision of safety of their ships through analysis of the maritime casualties and their possible reasons.
 Traveling by water nowadays is not problem-free. In fact there are several problems associated with it and most of them are relating to the safety and security. The recent cases of attacks and theft from the passenger ships and yachts showed the increase of the maritime piracy in Asian waters. In addition to that, the problem of stowaways also shows the existing difficulties for the modern seamanship.
It happens quite often that seamen face these problems being unprepared. The maritime piracy is considered a worldwide problem of today, however this is not the only problem encountered. Another problem is the maritime terrorism. The present publication was written in order to assist all modern sailors in making sure that their adventure of sailing does not end up with a catastrophe.
The information provided by the author will be useful to those seriously caring about the safety and security of their vessels and people on board. The book will take the readers all the way from the basic information on contemporary maritime terrorism, through evaluation of the hazards to the fundamentals of the maritime defense. Numerous checklists have been included for the necessary checks to be done when preparing to the voyage.
 This one of the best publications on the lifeboats of those available today. As we all know, the lifeboats are deservedly considered the critically important lifesaving arrangements on board ships and offshore installations. That is why thorough knowledge and good understanding of their construction, technical features, launching and handling is an absolutely must have knowledge for every single person on board any ship.
Even though declared to be of a pocket size, the present encyclopedia boasts remarkably comprehensive coverage. The author makes an excellent tour through the different lifeboat designs. The lifeboats are grouped by the countries where they have been developed and manufacture. In addition to that, there is a separate chapter included by the author to shed some light on the most famous lifeboat disaster.
Once you have read subject chapter, you will get feel why it is so important to know and understand the lifesaving equipment you have on board – the proper and timely response to an emergency would be impossible without such knowledge. The book is full of detailed and informative color images which will be appreciated even by the people outside the industry as they make reading much more interesting.
 The document released by the Merchant Marine Academy of Macedonia. The publication covers the most important aspects of maritime security of today. The author of the dissertation made an excellent effort in trying to provide readers with the information relating to the onboard security in the modern shipping industry. He has performed a thorough analysis of the counter-piracy measures and their effectiveness.
In addition, the author has also addressed the problem of stowaways and gave some recommendations on how to prevent stowaways on board ships. Another matter taken into consideration was the drug smuggling and again some guidelines have been provided that, when applied, would help to eliminate the problem. The paper opens with the brief information about the top governing document, namely the ISPS Code together with the scope, requirements and national implementation of its requirements.
A big portion of the publication is devoted to the newly introduced requirements applicable to the security training to be provided to all shipboard personnel. This is not a textbook on maritime security and it has never meant to be it, but the volume will be useful when treated as a supplementary training material and reference.
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