PSC deficiency code 11131: On board training and instructions
Area 11 Life-saving appliances
Code 11131 sits in the life-saving appliances group and covers how the crew learns to use them: the ship's training manual, the training given to people who join, and the instructions posted at survival craft and their controls. When an inspector writes it, the doubt is whether today's crew would know how to launch the boats and rafts and use what's in them.
What the inspector looks at
This code often comes out of a drill or a walk around the boat deck with a crew member.
- The LSA training manual: on board, in the working language, specific to this ship, and kept in the mess and recreation rooms or in each cabin
- Records of on-board training for recent joiners, checked against their joining dates
- Operating instructions at each lifeboat, liferaft and launching station, legible and lit by emergency lighting
- Whether a crew member can explain the launching sequence at their own station, including the release gear
- Donning instructions for immersion suits and lifejackets where they're stowed
- How the training fits the drill programme in the safety management system
Common findings
- Training manual not ship-specific, describes davit-launched lifeboat, ship fitted with free-fall lifeboat
- Training manual not available in crew mess room
- Operating instructions at liferaft launching station faded and illegible
- No record of on-board LSA training for crew members joined last month
- Crew members unable to explain lifeboat release procedure
- Training manual not in the working language of the ship
The rule behind it
SOLAS chapter III holds the requirements. Regulation 35 sets out the training manual and on-board training aids, what the manual must explain and where copies are kept. Regulation 19 requires crew with emergency duties to be familiar with them before the voyage starts, and to receive on-board training in the ship's life-saving appliances as soon as possible and no later than two weeks after joining. Regulation 9 requires posters or signs at or near survival craft and launching controls showing how to operate them. The fire safety training manual is a separate chapter II-2 document coded in the fire safety group.
Action codes you are likely to see
Replacing faded instructions or putting the manual back in the mess room during the visit usually gets 10. A manual that doesn't match the ship's equipment often gets 17 or 16, depending on how quickly the company can send a corrected one. Training records missing for several crew may point to an ISM issue and come with 18. A crew that can't launch survival craft at a drill can be part of a detention (30), often written together with the drill code. See action taken codes.
How to close it
The chief officer or safety officer leads, with the office supplying a ship-specific manual. Hold the missing training for the crew involved and record it with names and signatures. Keep the corrected manual's cover page, the training records and photos of the new instructions with the Form B. Related: abandon ship drills, lifeboats, inflatable liferafts and launching arrangements.