For twelve years the International Maritime Human Element Bulletin Alert! has been regularly published, its mission being to raise awareness of human element issues.
Ship designers, builders, managers and operators have all been given plenty to think about around the way that people and ships require harmonious integration if the former is to get the most out of the latter.
Forty issues after the first Alert!, the publication, sponsored by the Lloyd’s Register Foundation and published by the Nautical Institute, has reached its final issue and its natural conclusion.
There is a splendid archive of useful knowledge which will remain available and will be maintained on the website, to hopefully influence everyone involved in the industry today and in the future.
Understanding of the human element and its integration into every facet of ship design and operation will have been greatly enhanced by this and other initiatives which have brought the issue out of the background and very much into the centre of the stage.
To many over the years it had seemed strange that so much effort had been spent in regulating structure and technology, while the human element was regarded as a subject that was different and arguably “too hard” to confront.
As Professor Richard Clegg, Managing Director of the Lloyd’s Register Foundation, points out in the final edition recently published, the need for this initiative was firmly based on evidence which demonstrated that right across the industry, there was this requirement. Alert! has produced a defined, authoritative body of knowledge to encourage the adoption of relevant human element principles for all practitioners.
Commodore David Squire, who has edited the journal throughout its 12 years of existence suggests that “only time will tell whether the project has truly influenced the way in which the various industry stakeholders deal with human element issues and whether there has been a reduction in the number of accidents resulting from human error”. But he also affirms that there is a greater awareness of this important subject.
If there is one vital lesson that is genuinely being learned it is that human beings don’t just “fit in where they can” to a ship that has been designed for all the other non-human criteria that forms its specification.
It is the fact that people will live on a ship, often for extended periods, and will operate all that vessel’s equipment and systems and must do so safely and efficiently, which governs the new integrated approach that has been advocated by Alert! over the past dozen years.
The final issue contains an interesting assessment by a current ship science student at a leading university, who confirms that there is much to do if a proper understanding of human element issues is to form an integral part of the design process.
