Blackout Drill 16/07/2016

The purpose was to inform and discuss with engineering crew what actions would need to be carried
out in the event of a blackout on board the ship.

My role in this drill was to listen to the crews discussion of what they would do and to observe the
locations of the main generator manual start and circuit breakers that would need to be activated
once power had been regained from a main generator.

The chief Engineer produced a scenario and asked the crew what their actions would be and what
would happen in the first 20 seconds after a main generator had stopped completely.

In the first 20 seconds of the blackout the emergency batteries would supply power to Navigation
equipment, radio equipment emergency switchboard and emergency generator start and to the
UPS. The emergency batteries have a working time of approximately 40 minutes

The emergency generator would begin its starting process within 5 seconds and a power supply from
the emergency generator would be expected within 30 seconds. The emergency generator supplies
power to all essential equipment on board eg. Steering gear, control air compressor, emergency
generator start, emergency switchboard, fire pumps, emergency bilge pump, watertight doors, CO2
control room and for emergency lighting.

Once the emergency generator is supplying power the standby generator will try to start.

If the emergency generator does not start and there is no supply power for control systems the main
generator can be manually started using the remaining air in the starting air reservoir.

Once full power supply is regained there is a blackout checklist with procedures that must be carried
out. This list consists of starting cooling pumps and resetting air compressors.