MARINA ELECTRICAL SAFETY SEMINAR©

Preventing Property Damage and Injury

 

We recently learned about marina electrical safety seminars being conducted by James D. Shafer. These sound like very interesting seminars so we’re passing this information on to you.

 

About the Seminars

The purpose of these seminars is to help marina personnel recognize some of the more common hazards associated with providing AC shore power to moored boats. The classroom session, and then the hands-on portion on the dock, will present a rather technical subject in a way that will be useful to non-technical as well as technical marina staff.

Providing electric power to boats in the marina is a unique challenge.  Because electricity goes about its task of providing services and comfort, quietly and unobserved, symptoms of a serious potential problem might not be recognized until too late to prevent an accident.

We will consider all the elements of the electrical system.  The distribution supplied by the utility, circuit breaker panels, power connections at the pedestals, how the boat becomes involved, and the most critical element – the bonding and grounding system.  Most of the accidents and fatalities we have investigated occurred because of some failure of this final element, either on the dock or on a boat.

Several hours will be spent in a classroom setting with a slide presentation, and will provide the opportunity to develop an understanding of what will take place out on the dock.

The remainder of the program will provide an opportunity on the dock to witness simulatedproblems, and learn how to recognize them.  Simple tests and what they mean will be demonstrated.

The material presented is based on our investigation of almost 60 accidents, including over 40 fatalities; we will endeavor toanswerany and all questions. Galvanic and stray current damage will also be discussed.

Information on ground fault monitoring and several accident reports can be found at:

http://www.marinaguard.net                                       

 

For more information about attending or sponsoring one of these programs please contact James D. Shafer, AMS at: kp2r@bellsouth.net