Captain's responsibility

National and international maritime law determine the legal status of the ship's captain. The size of the vessel does not matter. The captain of an ocean liner and a small vessel have the same amount of legal responsibility and authority.

The Captain is solely responsible for the safety of the vessel and the people on board the vessel.

The exclusive responsibility of the captain for the safety of navigation determines the necessary amount of knowledge, skills and abilities that the captain must possess.

The captain can be found guilty and brought to administrative, criminal and civil liability not only for violation of the written rules, but also for non-compliance with the rules of Good Maritime Practice, which caused an accident or death.

Sailing Safety and Good Maritime Practice

What is it - Good maritime practice, what are its rules, is not certain by law. There is also no unambiguous definition of this concept in the literature and, of course, nowhere is there an exhaustive list of the rules that make it up.

And there is responsibility for its non-compliance.

For example, the International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREG) establish unavoidable liability for consequences that may result from neglect of any precaution required by normal maritime practice or the special circumstances of the case. And, under Rule 8 of the COLREG, any action taken to prevent a collision must comply with good maritime practice.

Good maritime practice is much broader than the body of rules and regulations set out in numerous regulatory documents governing navigation.

This is the maximum care shown in any situation, and the ability to provide for all scenarios, and the use of the safest methods in navigation, and the ability to act in an emergency. But above all, it is common sense multiplied by thousands of years of seafaring experience.

Good maritime practice provides for the implementation of all those measures that are actually necessary to ensure the safety of navigation.

Navigation safety includes:

• Knowledge of dangerous situations;
• Recognizing signs of a dangerous situation;
• Taking all possible measures to prevent a dangerous situation;
• Implementation of necessary actions for struggle for the survivability of the vessel and rescue of people.

Boatmaster training

The lack of a complete list of rules, measures and actions necessary to ensure the safety of navigation, and constituting Good Maritime Practice, is due to the fact that it is simply impossible to list all the great many dangerous situations.

And the captain must make the right decision in each specific condition, taking into account all specific circumstances. At the same time, reinsurance is as contrary to the rules of Good Maritime Practice as excessive risk and underestimation of real danger.

This determines the requirements for the organization that trains boatmasters.

In addition to studying the rules of navigation, navigation, location, ship arrangement, technical requirements for design and mechanisms, ship control techniques, it is necessary to master the knowledge and understanding of the rules of Good Maritime Practice necessary to ensure the safety of navigation.

And this is possible only through the transfer of accumulated experience from teachers with professional maritime education and many years of professional experience in navigation.

Navigational school

The teaching staff of the Navigational School consists of teachers and instructors with higher maritime education, who have many years of professional maritime experience and have been engaged in sailing and water-motor sports since childhood. The teachers include sea captains, yacht captains, rescuers, specialists in maritime law.

The navigation school has its own fleet of 5 keel sailing yachts and motor boats.

The navigation school trains skippers of power and sailing pleasure (non-commercial) boats, captains and crew members of pleasure and sports sailing ships, skippers and IYT skippers.

Training is carried out both in full-time and in part-time form using e-learning and distance learning technologies.