1 Contracting Governments undertake, each for
its national ships, to maintain, or, if it is necessary, to adopt,
measures for the purpose of ensuring that, from the point of view
of safety of life at sea, all ships shall be sufficiently and efficiently
manned.footnote
2 Every ship to which chapter I applies shall
be provided with an appropriate minimum safe manning document or equivalent
issued by the Administration as evidence of the minimum safe manning
considered necessary to comply with the provisions of paragraph 1.
3 On all ships, to ensure effective crew performance
in safety matters, a working language shall be established and recorded
in the ship's log-book. The company, as defined in regulation IX/1, or the master, as appropriate,
shall determine the appropriate working language. Each seafarer shall
be required to understand and, where appropriate, give orders and
instructions and to report back in that language. If the working language
is not an official language of the State whose flag the ship is entitled
to fly, all plans and lists required to be posted shall include a
translation into the working language.
4 On ships to which chapter I applies, English
shall be used on the bridge as the working language for bridge-to-bridge
and bridge-to-shore safety communications as well as for communications
on board between the pilot and bridge watchkeeping personnelfootnote, unless those directly involved in the communication
speak a common language other than English.