VICTORIA, British Columbia — The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is worried about marijuana use by British Columbia ferry crew members, based on interviews following a fatal ferry sinking last year.
Board spokesman John Cottreau said Wednesday there has been no suggestion that crew members were high when the Queen of the North slammed into an island and sank in March 2006, but investigators were told pot use was not uncommon between shifts, on board as well as off the vessel.
Two people vanished and are presumed dead and 99 passengers and crew were rescued after the sinking.
“We interviewed enough people who told us the crews were regularly smoking cannabis, and a pattern began to emerge,” Cottreau said in an interview with The Canadian Press from Gatineau, Quebec. “We have reason now to believe the practice continues and it may not be isolated to a few individuals.”
A top ferry system official said the safety board should allow mandatory testing for drugs and alcohol. A union leader planned to issue a statement later Wednesday.
The board has sent warnings on the issue to British Columbia Ferry Services and the Ferry and Marine workers’ Union, Cottreau said.
“Ferry crews whose performance is impaired by cannabis are a clear risk to the traveling public,” board chairwoman Wendy Taro said in a news release. “We are confident that B.C. Ferries will determine the extent of the problem and effectively manage this risk so it will not lead to a serious accident.”
B.C. Ferries president David Hahn said the corporation has a zero-tolerance policy on alcohol and other drug use, adding that the safety board should recommend to Canadian Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon that ferry operators be allowed to conduct mandatory drug and alcohol testing on employees in safety-sensitive positions.
The prohibition covers all the hours crew members are on and off duty from the time they board a vessel until their release for rest days.
In isolated cases where the zero tolerance policy has been violated, employees have been fired, Hahn said, but he asserted that mandatory testing is the only proven method of ensuring protection for the traveling public.
He also said the company would conduct further investigations into the safety board’s findings.
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