Tag Archives: Skipper Michael Hill
JMT tragedy: Looking for answers – and an apology
I’m writing this after my annual trip to sit at Rame Head and look over the spot where my son Michael and his colleague Shane Hooper died nine years ago. Shane was 33 when he died, and Michael was 22. I’ve been fighting since then for some kind of justice, and for changes that will prevent other needless deaths at sea. The fundamental issue that saw my son go to sea in a boat that was certified as safe, but most certainly was not, has never been addressed. Michael was fishing at the age of 14, whelking as soon as he was able to leave school and work full-time, and well used to weights on deck. He wanted to go scalloping, and I found what was advertised as the ideal boat for him. The boat, called JMT, was an under- 10m scalloper, and had just passed its MCA survey, then conducted through Seafish. If I had had an additional independent survey done (this haunts me to this day), it would have been deemed unsafe immediately. more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 13:01
MAIB ‘Safety Lessons’ published one year after the tragic death of two Teignmouth fishermen
A list of so-called ‘Safety Lessons’ has been published following the sinking of a fishing boat in which two men from Teignmouth died. Skipper Michael Hill, who was 22, and crewman Shane Hooper, a 33-year-old father of three, died when the scalloper JMT went down four miles off Rame Head last July. The MAIB investigation identified that: • JMT capsized and sank at around 1501 on 9 July 2015; the weather was good at the time, with slight seas. • The vessel had only 25% of the reserve of stability required by larger fishing vessels. • The vessel’s stability had been adversely affected by structural modifications and by aspects of the vessel’s operation. • Capsize was possibly triggered by emptying the starboard dredges while the port dredges and their contents remained suspended. • The crew’s likelihood of survival was reduced by not having the opportunity to broadcast a distress message, release the EPIRB from its stowage, lifejackets not being worn and the failure of the liferaft to surface. Read the report, and the article here 12:11
