Galasso, George

"Since the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary (OCNMS or sanctuary) was designated in 1994, there has been an ongoing effort to track a number of different types of incidents in or in the vicinity of the sanctuary. The types of incidents that were tracked and the reasons for the collection of that information varies. One of the most obvious and consistent reasons is the tracking of violations of sanctuary regulations. The majority of these include low overflights, small oils spills, and sunken or grounded vessels. An additional category involves incidents described as near misses. These typically included, but are not limited to, large commercial vessels that had mechanical difficulties and may have called for assistance. This report focuses on incidents that resulted in vessels being lost in or near the sanctuary. This includes vessels that have sunk, grounded or capsized regardless of whether the vessel was salvaged or remnants of the wreck remain in the marine environment. The report documents the sanctuary's Incident Database, how the data were collected, processed and summarized. Out of all incident records, 46 vessels were identified for further analysis. Data collected on those incidents was summarized to see if there were commonalities based on causes and vessel characteristics. The intended audiences are sanctuary staff, the sanctuary advisory council and partner governments and agencies"--Introduction.

National Ocean Service (NOS)