NTSB: Fire on Dinner-Cruise Boat Shows Need for Industry-Wide SMS Rules

 

A fire that broke out on a dinner cruise vessel in Boston Harbor last year demonstrates continued safety shortcomings in the passenger vessel industry, according to a National Transportation Safety Board investigation released this week.

The March 2023 incident aboard the Spirit of Boston, which occurred while the vessel was moored at Commonwealth Pier, has led federal investigators to call for stricter safety protocols for passenger vessels nationwide - particularly regarding crew supervision and safety management systems.

The NTSB investigation found that the fire started when a server assistant improperly disposed of a chafing fuel canister used to keep food warm during dinner service. The canister, which was likely still lit, fell beneath a plastic glassware cart in a wait station on the vessel's main deck level, igniting the cart and forcing the evacuation of 16 people. 

The fire caused extensive damage to the vessel's structure. The heat warped the steel beams in the overhead and buckled the tiled deck above the wait station. The rolling glassware cart turned into a solid mass of glass and melted plastic, and investigators had to X-ray it to find the suspect chafing fuel canister.

Serving compartment after the fire (left) and the melted mass of plastic carts, glassware and debris recovered from within the space (right)

While no pollution or injuries were reported, the incident has raised concerns about fire safety practices across the dinner cruise industry, where hospitality staff routinely handle open-flame devices with minimal formal training.

Investigators found that no marine crew members were present on the vessel when the fire broke out, leaving only hospitality staff who lacked proper emergency response training. None of the serving staff attempted to put out the fire with a fire extinguisher while it was still small.

"The marine crew members are trained to respond to a small fire like the one the hospitality staff discovered," the report stated, noting that such personnel "were much more capable of handling the emergency."

According to NTSB, the operating company had no documented procedures for handling the open-flame devices commonly used aboard its vessels, and staff sometimes used methods that contradicted manufacturer guidelines.

"Some staff reported attempting to extinguish the canisters by blowing them out, while others said they used water — both methods explicitly warned against by the manufacturer," NTSB stated. 

Hornblower, City Cruises' parent company, has since instituted a fleetwide ban on most open-flame devices aboard its fleet, except for chafing dish heaters and approved propane burners. 

The NTSB has recommended that City Cruises US should require at least one marine crew member to remain aboard until all other personnel have left the vessel. The agency also called for the company to implement a formal safety management system. The Passenger Vessel Association, an industry group, has developed a voluntary safety management program called Flagship, but City Cruises US - a large-scale operator with 125 vessels - had not implemented it or any other SMS at the time of the incident.

The fire investigation has broader implications for the passenger vessel industry. In its report, the NTSB reiterated a long-standing recommendation that the Coast Guard should require all U.S.-flagged passenger vessels to implement safety management systems, which are already required for larger seagoing vessels. The NTSB has renewed its call for a mandatory SMS requirement many times over the years, and has criticized the Coast Guard for failing to roll out a regulation after several major marine casualties with multiple loss of life.

Despite congressional authorization for the U.S. Coast Guard to make commercial passenger vessel operators write and use an SMS, implementation has been slow. The Coast Guard has encouraged voluntary use of safety management systems, but given the history of non-adoption by some operators, NTSB believes that this is not enough.