Iranzu Sotés's research while affiliated with Universidad del País Vasco / Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea and other places

The aim of this paper is to analyse the meaning of beach safety flags and their management along the Northern Spanish coast. There are more than 1000 small beaches, which are often in high demand by tourism during the summer season. To carry out the research, most of main beaches have been visited to observe and analyse the meaning of all the safety flags and their correct use depending on the oceanographic and meteorological conditions. The influence of the beach safety management and regulations on the use of beach safety signage has been also analysed. The results show that safety flag systems differ even between very close beaches where safety management is in the hands of different local governments. Outdated and local legal framework and the absence of an agreed system between the different organizations that provide lifeguarding services seem to be behind this lack of uniformity. A specific guide for beach safety flags and signage within a national safety beach plan agreed by all the autonomic or provincial governments may be a solution.

This paper analyses the marine accident reports published by the USA National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) between June 1975 and September 2017, in order to ascertain the exact influence of the crew and/or other people involved (pilots, company, etc.) on the cause of the incident and to find out the types of errors made by them. Additionally, the mistakes and those involved are analysed together to verify the correct implementation of international regulations concerning seafarers. The results suggest that crew error is relatively uncommon in cargo and passenger fleets. This points to the effectiveness of the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW convention). However, taking into consideration the high percentage of human error due to failure in communication and misjudgements during navigation in pilot waters, it may be deduced that the coordination among those on the bridge may be improved. On the other hand, crew error on board tugs exceeds 50%. This increase seems to be due to the difficulties of navigation in narrow waterways.

In Biscay beaches, the Biscay Regional Council (BRC) is in charge of looking after the safety of beachgoers. Its aim is to reduce drownings and accidents to zero. Lifeguard services during the summer seasons should be enough to reach this target. But not everything depends on them. There is another key factor to consider: beach users and the extent to which they obey the rules for bathing. Beach users carry out different activities in the surf area, which increases the hazards and the disputes between them. Proactive action such as warning signage and environment education are useful tools to increase beachgoers awareness of the potential risks and how to avoid them. The motivation for this study is to analyze beachgoers’ environmental understanding, their signage perception and their behavior and safety education, from the point of view of the lifeguards. Methodology is based on a main survey for lifeguards and a secondary survey for users. The analysis of the results shows the need for a common safety educational plan and a standardized flag and signage plan supported by the Spanish Authorities.

Tourism development at small beaches leads to overcrowding and, consequently, tends to increase the hazards for bathers. The techniques to manage the bathers' capacity include the knowledge of the area where the bathers may enjoy themselves far away from beach dangers. The marine environment, the demography pressure and the popularity of sport activities such as surfing may affect the safety in the bathing zone. Moreover, the area of this bathing zone may change due to beach morphodynamics. Beaches in Biscay (Spanish North Atlantic coast) are small as a consequence of a rocky coastline and, consequently, overcrowding is a real danger. This paper is part of an investigation promoted by the Biscay Regional Council Office that provides a superficial beach model to manage beach occupancy. The intention is to obtain the bathers’ capacity inside a safe area for the spatial distribution of the beach water.

Beachgoers are not aware of many hazards they may find in the seawater. In 2015 58% of drowning that occurred in Spain took place on the beach. The risk may be reduced by action on the vulnerability and the exposition. Swimming ability may help to decrease vulnerability but it seems not to be enough and, as for exposition, the knowledge of beach hazards is a good aid to reduce bathers' incidents. The aim of this paper is to know which is the knowledge acquired by students who have finished secondary education. Three hundred and sixty four first year students from the University of the Basque Country were surveyed by means of a questionnaire with the purpose of knowing their swimming level, their profile as beach users, their knowledge of rip currents and how to recognize them, and their interpretation of the beach safety information and signals. The research shows that, although more than 95% of respondents go to the beach, the swimming level is low given that 51% can swim between 25 and 100 m. On the other hand, their knowledge of rip currents is also very low. However it is surprising that there are more rescuers than people saved. These results lead us to think that an Aquatic Safety Educational Plan is necessary as soon as possible.

Many ship accidents have arisen from an error in course indication. Bearing in mind that the actual errors in gyrocompass and satellite compass are really minor, they may be considered valid to be input into an autopilot provided that any failure in such devices is controlled by means of a secondary heading source such as a magnetic compass. However, magnetic compass deviation may be significant and its heading should be corrected before being input to the autopilot. The errors caused by the geographic variability of the deviation should also be taken into account. Moreover, the current way to reduce the deviation requires that the ship is un-berthed to execute a complete swing. The aim of this article is to obtain a ship magnetic model by means of an algorithm based on least squares to correct magnetic compass heading input in the autopilot and to permit definitive magnetic compass compensation without swinging the ship through 360°.