HOUSTON -- A supervisor for the Glomar Java Sea drilling ship testified Thursday he ignored advice from a Chinese oil official to move the ship from the path of a typhoon before the vessel sank last October with 81 crewmembers aboard.
Joseph Fry, China drilling supervisor for the Atlantic Richfield Co., said he made no special efforts to notify the ship or establish radio contact with the ship as Typhoon Lex approached because he felt officials and crewmen aboard the ship were in a better position to analyze their needs.
'I think they should be telling us what they think rather than us telling them what we think,' Fry said.
Fry acknowledged that a Chinese oil official suggested the Glomar be moved from the path of Typhoon Lex, but he said he felt preparations were complete.
ARCO was responsible for drilling operations, while Global Marine Inc., owner of the ship, was responsible for maintaining the ship.
Fry was one of the last witnesses to testify in the fourth of a series of hearings to determine the cause of the sinking of the Glomar Java Sea in South china Sea near Vietnam.
Investigators with the U.S. Coast Guard and the National Transportation Safety Board expect to conclude their investigation later this year.
Divers located bodies of 34 crewmen aboard the sunken drilling ship, owned by Global Marine Inc. of Houston. The other 47 are presumed dead, although the father of a Texas crewman says survivors have been seen in Vietnamese prisons.
U.S. Coast Guard Captain Walter McDougall, in an unexpected move, obtained a copy of a letter from a Vietnamese refugee who claimed to have seen crewmember John Pierce and five other Americans in a prison in Da Nang three weeks after the accident.
Pierce's father, attorney Douglas Pierce, made the letter public at the start of this week's hearings.
McDougall said the board, on advice of the State Department, is working under the premise that there is no evidence of survivors.
'We feel we have more important information to look for at this time,' he said.
Dr. John Slater, a metallurgist with Failure Analysis Associates Inc., testified Thursday his firm had found no flaws in the structure of three sections of steel armor plates recovered from the ship.
'In a series of tests for defects, we found none,' Slater testified.
Another witness, Dr. Donald Liu, assistant vice president of the American Bureau of Shipping, said a study by his firm indicated the ship could have withstood extreme weather conditions associated with the typhoon.
The testimony appeared to discredit theories that the ship suffered structural defects which would have caused it crack and break into pieces and sink.
Divers who searched the ship after the accident found a large vertical crack in its hull. Investigators have no firm explanation for the split.
NTSB investigators expect to issue a final report in September, but McDougall said it could be several months before the Coast Guard investigation is complete.
F. Dore Hunter, a Boston attorney representing the survivors of three men killed in the accident, said testimony during this week's hearing could support Global Marine's efforts to limit its liability in the accident if it can prove that human error aboard the ship -- and not official company actions -- contributed to the sinking.
