Leading insurer to the fishing industry, Sunderland Marine, has published a free to download new safety guide in order to promote safe working practices onboard fishing vessels.
Called ‘Safe Out, Safe Home: A Safety Guide for New Fishing Crew’, the new graphic-novel-style guide is designed to give new crew a quick introduction to the safety training, as well as prompt skippers to provide it.
Alvin Forster, loss prevention executive at Sunderland Marine’s parent North Group, said that the guide was created following a review of worldwide fishing vessel claims which revealed many of the incidents were due to failures in safety management onboard.
“Fishing boats are exciting and rewarding places to work, but newcomers should know that working at sea is very different to working on land,” he said.
“It is also isolated, with only the crew members to keep each other safe, meaning that teamwork is essential. We hope this guide will help new joiners play their full part as well as prompting skippers to take responsibility for advising their crew on the risks and how they should prepare for them.”
The guide also highlights the importance of staying safe when working in different parts of the boat – such as on deck, in machinery rooms and in the freezer holds.
Mr Forster added that claims to the company found that most injuries were caused by slips, trips and falls, followed by being struck by or entangled with equipment.
Other prominent types of accident ranged from exposure to dangerous atmospheres to incorrect manual lifting and severe burns from fire or explosion.
