Seven months after returning the expedition that located the remains of the
Villa de Pitanxo,
the
fishing boat , at the bottom of the sea
which capsized in February 2022 in the waters of Newfoundland (Canada), the expert report concludes that the most probable direct cause of the accident in which 21 crew members of the Galician trawler died “was a human error by the captain.”
The opinion presented by the Permanent Commission for the Investigation of Maritime Accidents (CIAIM) in the Central Court of Instruction number two of the National Court, which is investigating the case, maintains that “the lack of full perception of the risk of sinking posed by the “maneuver ordered by the captain to free the rig from the seabed.”
The report, prepared after analyzing the images captured during the immersion of an underwater robot to the wreck last June, dismantles the version of the ship's captain, José Enrique Padín, one of the only three survivors of the shipwreck and the main defendant, along with the company shipowner, in this open case for 21 reckless homicides.
Padín maintained that the accident was triggered by the sudden stop of the boat's engine.
However, experts support the thesis defended by sailor Samuel Kwesi, also a survivor, who questioned the captain's actions.
The conclusions indicate that the captain put the safety of the ship and its crew at “serious risk” by carrying out the rig maneuver “with the sea and the wind behind us and the waste discharge hopper open.”
In addition, the experts also consider the delay with which the captain gave the order to the crew to abandon the ship as a determining factor in the accident, “which conditioned their ability to abandon the ship in an orderly manner and with some probability of success,” they state. .
02:43
The sounds of the tragedy of Villa de Pitanxo
The opinion indicates that another key factor in the accident was the lack of familiarization of the crew members with their obligations and functions assigned in the organic framework for emergency situations and the use of life-saving devices.
This, in the opinion of the experts, “reveals the lack of training on board and the implementation of periodic abandon ship exercises.”
Another of the factors mentioned by the experts is the absence of a staircase on starboard, from the upper deck to the officers' deck, which would have contributed to the tragedy, since it would have been a “rapid means of evacuation from the deck exposed to the weather and the sea towards the life rafts,” the report states.
And the CIAIM experts add that the adverse maritime and meteorological conditions that were recorded at the time of the tragedy “were not of such extreme severity as to make it advisable to go to sea waiting for an improvement, but they undoubtedly made the maneuver difficult. clear the mess,” they conclude.
“It was worth getting on the boat”
As the second anniversary of the greatest tragedy in the fishing sector in Galicia approaches on February 15, the families of the 21 fatalities of the
Villa de Pitanxo
have celebrated the content of this report, which clears the judicial path.
“It was worth getting on the ship and this report confirms what we always defended,” said the spokesperson for the relatives, María José de Pazo.
“It was necessary to go down to the ship to have evidence and show the truth of what happened in the shipwreck,” added de Pazo.
“The report says that the version of the survivor Samuel Kwesi is credible,” the spokesperson stressed, since the judicial investigation began after this sailor changed his statement upon arriving in Spain, in clear contradiction with what the captain has defended. and his nephew, Eduardo Rial.
The sailor of Ghanaian origin and nationalized in Spain described before the Judicial Police possible negligence on the part of the captain that would have triggered the sinking, ensuring that the boat's engine did not stop suddenly, but rather that the ship became muddy (the nets were caught to the seabed) and the captain tried to unload it, causing what happened.
However, Padín always insisted that the ship was left without an engine while drifting.
The families' lawyer, Manuel Lampón, spoke along the same lines, arguing that the report states that the engine had not stopped suddenly, but was active practically until the ship sank.
The lawyer believes that the report supports the alleged negligence of the captain and the responsibility of the shipowner, Grupo Nores.
The Galician trawler capsized at dawn 450 kilometers off the coast of Newfoundland (Canada).
During the investigation, the judge took statements from the captain of the fishing boat, his nephew Eduardo Rial and the sailor Samuel Kwesi, as witnesses, as they were the only survivors of the shipwreck.
Several directors of the Grupo Nores shipowner, as well as former sailors of the ship, have also appeared before Judge Ismael Moreno.
The prosecution's accusation focused on the version of the prosecution witness, Samuel Kwesi, now largely supported by the CIAIM's report of conclusions.
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