Measures to Reduce the Occurrence of Maritime Casualties on the Central American Region

Abstract

1[1ie lack of maritime casualties investigations and the record keeping of these maritime accidents in the Central Americari Region (CAR) are the primary reasons why the respective governments of this Region were unable to 'carry out the analysis of the maritime sectors' safety. According to Porras et al(i), the maritime casualties occurred on the Pacific side of CAR between 1980 and 2004 caii be associated with the anival of atmospheric events such as Hurricanes, Tropical Storms, El Nino and La Nifia to this Region. In addition, the lack of safety measures onboard was determined to be another important cause of such aecidents, which are characterized by a 1arge number of fatalities and missing persons annually. Data clearly indicate that the safety measures taken by the Japanese Maritime Authority, since 1980 greatly improved the maritime safety of Japanese fleet, drastically decreasing the' number of fatalities and missing persons as a result of maritime accidents. Based on the differences observed between the CAR Maritime Organization and the Japan Maritime Organization found by Porras et al(2), the authors propose in this paper the safety measures that will result in reduction of maritime fatalities and missing persons in the CAR counuies. The objective of this research is to propose measures to reduce the occurrence of maritime casualties on Central American Region in order to reduce the number of death and missing person during the accidents.