The ship was detained due to the following detainable deficiency:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
05118 Operation of GMDSS equipment – SECOND OFFICER NOT FAMILIAR WITH THE<\/p>\n\n\n\n
OPERATION OF THE GMDSS RADIO<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n So it was decided to appeal with MOU<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n .1 The Convention reference quoted for the detainable deficiency is SOLAS Chapter IV<\/p>\n\n\n\n Regulation 16, which requires radio personnel to have appropriate qualification and<\/p>\n\n\n\n certification, but, actually, in addition to the second officer, there are three other<\/p>\n\n\n\n officers with the relevant qualification and certificates on board the vessel; therefore it<\/p>\n\n\n\n is considered that the vessel fulfilled the requirements for distress and safety<\/p>\n\n\n\n radiocommunication;<\/p>\n\n\n\n .2 There may be some confusions between PSCOs and the second officer regarding<\/p>\n\n\n\n DSC test call or GMDSS radio; based on ship\u2019s GMDSS logbook, the second officer<\/p>\n\n\n\n demonstrated his ability to carry out DSC test successfully; and<\/p>\n\n\n\n .3 Evidence provided by the Maritime Operations Centre concerned confirmed that test<\/p>\n\n\n\n calls from the vessel during the inspection were successfully transmitted and<\/p>\n\n\n\n received; such indicated that the vessel\u2019s equipment was fully operational at the time<\/p>\n\n\n\n of the inspection and that shipboard personnel were capable of establishing distress<\/p>\n\n\n\n and safety radiocommunications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Based on the above, the opinion that the detention (code 30) should be reconsidered and downgraded to code 17.<\/p>\n\n\n\n .1 The initial action by the second officer in response to the PSCO\u2019s request for a<\/p>\n\n\n\n GMDSS DSC test call was wrong (i.e.: making a voice call rather than a DSC test);<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. The second officer also failed to provide the reply\/acknowledgement from the relevant<\/p>\n\n\n\n coast station for the DSC tests during the inspection; and<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Based on the muster list, the second officer is the watchkeeping officer in charge of<\/p>\n\n\n\n operation of GMDSS equipment but he failed to demonstrate the required proficiency;<\/p>\n\n\n\n in accordance with procedures set out in paragraph 3.1.1 and subparagraph 3.1.1.4<\/p>\n\n\n\n of Port State Control Procedures 2011 (A.1052(27)), this would be considered for<\/p>\n\n\n\n making the ship substandard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Based on the above, the detention was correct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The panel members reviewed the relevant information and materials received. As the result<\/p>\n\n\n\n of evaluation, panel members reached general opinions as follows:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Based on guidance for PSC on GMDSS in the PSC Manual, \u201cinsufficient number of<\/p>\n\n\n\n qualified GMDSS operators and the inability of ship\u2019s radio personnel to use ship\u2019s<\/p>\n\n\n\n radio equipment\u201d may warrant detention. But the vessel did have sufficient number of<\/p>\n\n\n\n personnel who could operate the GMDSS equipment correctly as evidenced by the<\/p>\n\n\n\n records and logs on board. This is further substantiated by the radio logs available<\/p>\n\n\n\n from the coast radio stations;<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. There is also no sufficient evidence to suggest that the second officer is so<\/p>\n\n\n\n insufficiently proficient to render the ship unsafe for sea. Moreover the ship is carrying<\/p>\n\n\n\n sufficient radio personnel, even after excluding the second officer, who are qualified;<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Although at the time of testing, the non-acknowledgement of test calls may give the<\/p>\n\n\n\n impression that the equipment is not operational or the second officer is not proficient,<\/p>\n\n\n\n however after receiving the correspondences from radio station, the Port State should<\/p>\n\n\n\n consider to amend the detention since the ship is not considered to be unsafe;<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. From the information available, it appears that the PSCO had clear grounds to<\/p>\n\n\n\n conduct a more detailed inspection, insofar that the Master or crew (in this case the<\/p>\n\n\n\n second officer) was unable to demonstrate operation of a DSC test call. This was<\/p>\n\n\n\n attributed to the lack of operational knowledge of the second officer by the PSCO. In<\/p>\n\n\n\n this specific case, the presence of 3 PSCOs may have made the second officer<\/p>\n\n\n\n nervous, which would have adversely effected his ability to test the equipment. It<\/p>\n\n\n\n would be prudent that PSCOs would continue the inspection and return later, after<\/p>\n\n\n\n allowing time to test the equipment without the oversight of the PSCO, to ascertain<\/p>\n\n\n\n whether the issue was equipment or personnel related; and<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5. The Convention reference (pertaining to the qualification of the radio personnel<\/p>\n\n\n\n (SOLAS Chap. IV\/Reg.16)) appeared technically incorrect. The deficiency would<\/p>\n\n\n\n perhaps have been better attributed to an ISM deficiency under familiarization<\/p>\n\n\n\n required under element 6 of the ISM code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The panel members are of the unanimous opinion that the decision of detention was not<\/p>\n\n\n\n justified. Therefore, the port State Authority would be asked to reconsider the decision of the<\/p>\n\n\n\n detention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" How from code 30 to code 17 Ground for detention The ship was detained due to the following detainable deficiency: 05118 Operation of GMDSS equipment – SECOND OFFICER NOT FAMILIAR WITH THE OPERATION OF THE GMDSS RADIO So it was decided to appeal with MOU Dispute .1 The Convention reference […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":753,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111],"tags":[298,829,8,258,594,233,737,830,197,230,456,272,212,224,204],"class_list":["post-752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-psc-focus","tag-flagstate","tag-gmdss","tag-marinersupdate","tag-marinesafety","tag-marinetraining","tag-maritime-2","tag-mastermariner","tag-nauticalinstitute","tag-portstatecontrol","tag-psc-2","tag-pscinspection","tag-seafarers-2","tag-shipmanagement","tag-shipping","tag-solas"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/wk-19-psc-cover-1024x576.png","blog_images":{"medium":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/wk-19-psc-cover-300x169.png","large":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/wk-19-psc-cover-1024x576.png"},"ams_acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=752"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":754,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752\/revisions\/754"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinersupdate.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
Dispute<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The port State Authority is of the opinion that:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
MOU Panel Decision<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Conclusion<\/h3>\n\n\n\n