Regulation 14 - Ships' manning
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Statutory Documents - IMO Publications and Documents - International Conventions - SOLAS - International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea - Chapter V - Safety of navigation - Regulation 14 - Ships' manning

Regulation 14 - Ships' manning

  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 For every ship to which chapter I applies, the Administration shall:

  • .1 establish appropriate minimum safe manning following a transparent procedure, taking into account the relevant guidance adopted by the Organizationfootnote; and

  • .2 issue an appropriate minimum safe manning document or equivalent as evidence of the minimum safe manning considered necessary to comply with the provisions of paragraph 1.

 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.


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