
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, July 4, 1990                   TAG: 9007040198
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-3   EDITION: HOLIDAY 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NORFOLK                                LENGTH: Medium

PILOT SAYS SHIP IN WRONG PLACE

The pilot of one of two ships involved in a collision in the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay that caused 30,000 gallons of fuel oil to spill told investigators Tuesday the other ship was in the wrong location.

Capt. John A. Jones, who was piloting the inbound Neptune Jade as it approached the entrance to the Hampton Roads harbor, told a joint Coast Guard-National Transportation Safety Board hearing that the outbound Columbus America was in the extreme northern side of the east-west channel - a position normally reserved for inbound ships.

Jones, 37 and a pilot for 17 years, said he was aware the Columbus America was out of position minutes before the collision Sunday, and radioed the pilot aboard the vessel to turn right, or south. Ships normally pass each other on the left, he said.

"He seemed to drift to the north on my radar. . . . Then he said, `I'm coming left, I'm coming left. She's not going to make it, Jack. I'm sorry," Jones said.

At the time visibility was zero as a heavy squall collided with a weather front over the harbor entrance, Jones said. The wind was blowing from the north at 35 knots to 40 knots, he said.

When the 635-foot-long Columbus America appeared, it was 650 feet to 1,000 feet from the oncoming 800-foot Neptune Jade. Jones ordered the Neptune Jade to full power and ordered a hard left-hand turn.

"If I had turned right or gone straight ahead, I would have cut her in half," he said. "All I was trying to do was not kill anybody."

He estimated the Neptune Jade was traveling at 10 knots when it struck a glancing blow along the Columbus America's starboard side. The Columbus America's 140,000-gallon fuel tank was ruptured, dumping the fuel into the bay and into the Norfolk inner harbor as it returned to port.

"My opinion is I believe the Columbus America was way too far north. How that happened, I do not know. He was well out of position," Jones told the panel.

The pilot aboard the Columbus America, Capt. Richard L. Counselman Jr., is scheduled to testify before the panel today. Both pilots are members of the Virginia Pilots' Association and licensed by both the state and the Coast Guard.

by CNB