​The Seastreak Wall Street, a high-speed passenger ferry serving commuters traveling between New Jersey and New York City, struck a Manhattan pier at about 12 knots on the morning of January 9, 2013. Of the 331 people on board, 79 passengers and 1 crewmember were injured, 4 of them seriously, in the third significant ferry accident to occur in the New York Harbor area in the last 10 years.

During the captain’s approach for docking, he intended to reduce speed and transfer control from one bridge station to another less than a minute before reaching Pier 11/Wall Street on the East River. Seastreak captains routinely used this procedure and changed stations for better visibility. In this instance, however, the maneuver proved unsuccessful, and the captain was unable to remain in control of the ferry before impact.

We determined that the probable cause of the Seastreak Wall Street’s allision with the pier was the captain’s loss of vessel control because he was unaware the propulsion system was in Backup mode. In addition, his usual method of transferring control from one bridge station to another during the approach to the pier did not allow sufficient time and distance to react to the loss of vessel control. Contributing to the accident was Seastreak LLC’s ineffective oversight of vessel operations. Contributing to the severity of injuries was Seastreak LLC’s lack of procedures to limit passenger access to stairwells on the Seastreak Wall Street during potentially high-risk situations such as vessel docking and undocking.​

We made recommendations to the United States Coast Guard regarding human factors standards for critical vessel controls, the need for operator control of ferry passenger access to stairwells, and the carriage of marine voyage data recorders. We also recommended that the owner of the Seastreak Wall Street improve specific control system displays and alerts, complete development and implementation of a safety management system, and revise its vessel operations and training manuals. We asked the manufacturer of the vessel’s propulsion control system to improve its design and alert its customers to the changes. The report also reclassifies previous recommendations to the Coast Guard regarding safety management systems and voyage data recorders.