The chair of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is again urging the U.S. Coast Guard to mandate safety management systems (SMS) on all U.S.-flagged passenger vessels.
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy reiterated the request in a Sept. 2 letter to U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Admiral Linda Fagan, commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard. The letter was sent on the five-year anniversary of the fire aboard the dive vessel Conception, which left 33 passengers and one crewmember dead off the coast of Santa Barbara, Calif.
“This terrible fire in 2019 was my first marine investigation as an NTSB board member, and my experience investigating the tragedy and my bond with the families affected, and deepened, my commitment to improving marine safety,” Homendy said in the letter.
“I am committed to ensuring the pain these families have faced receives the weighty and urgent consideration it deserves, and that NTSB’s safety recommendations resulting from this incident are implemented with all possible haste so that no one else suffers a similar tragedy,” the letter continued.
The Coast Guard enacted numerous regulations stemming from the Conception incident. But it has not mandated small passenger vessels have an SMS, something the NTSB has requested since at least 2010 following an incident involving the Staten Island Ferry in New York City that left dozens injured.
Homendy criticized the Coast Guard for what she described as “unacceptable inaction.” She made similar points in a media event held on Sept. 2 at the Conception memorial in Santa Barbara.
“Congress authorized the Coast Guard to mandate SMS in 2010. It’s 2024, and here we are, with no action,” Homendy said. “We know our recommendations save lives. I call on the Coast Guard to finish its work implementing solutions to prevent such a tragedy from occurring again.”
Authorities have not definitively identified the origin of the fire that burned the 75-foot Conception to the waterline. The NTSB attributed the incident to failures by the vessel owner, Truth Aquatics, which is now out of business. Vessel captain Jerry Boylan was convicted of misconduct or neglect of a ship officer in 2023, and in May 2024 was sentenced to four years in prison.
As of early September, a federal prison database indicates Boylan, 70, is not in custody of the Board of Prisons.