talked to hazelwood that night on the ship. how strong was the smell? it was strong enough to smell it at a distance of a few feet. turns out hazelwood and two other crew members had been drinking earlier that day. i didn t think it was a risk. i thought i was drinking moderately. it was normal, in the sense that none of us got abreintoxic. but what seemed normal was getting worse with every second. that very night, the mayor of valdez was meeting here at city hall with oil industry officials and local citizens. the topic what would the response be like if there were a major oil spill? when we come back, why they were right to worry. and later
third mate, with instructions to turn back into the shipping lane. i went down to my office, had some paperwork to fill out and i wanted to look at the latest weather. the third mate called hazelwood and said he was turning. but what happens next remains a mystery. the third mate and the helmsman at the wheel both say they followed orders. but whether it was miscommunication or poor 1/2 vags, navigation, the exx exxon valdez did not turn when it was supposed to. the turn was initiated. it was just initiated late. so late the ship ran aground. what do you think happened? i don t know. sad to say i wasn t there. according to the national transportation safety board, the third mate likely missed the turn due to fatigue and overwork, although the third
he was neither drunk nor reckless in his behavior. hazelwood was facing up to 12 years in prison for one felony and three misdemeanors. the jury would have to decide was he impaired at the time of the accident and was he reckless to leave two lower ranking shipmates to steer the tanker when he left the bridge? joseph hazelwood goes to trial this week. not a single witness testified that captain joe hazelwood showed signs of being impaired by alcohol that night. and his crew testified that he was calm, in control, and fit to command the ship. leaving the bridge is his only regret. the only thing i would have changed, if i could rewrite the whole script, i wouldn t have left the bridge.
sensitive positions, and better training for ship captains. exxonmobil says its unswerving commitment to safety has shown results, and that it has enduring regret over what happened. as for joseph hazelwood, his wife and daughter have stood by him. but his dream of returning to sea as a captain is over. he still has a license to pilot a super tanker, but no one has hired him. instead, he investigates maritime accidents for the lawyer who defended him, his best friend, michael challos. do you miss being a captain? parts of the job, i do. i miss the people, crew members. not surprising for a man who always wanted to go to sea. but what struck me was his special kinship with the people of alaska.
moment of impact, what do you remember? i was sitting at the desk in my office, and it just started to shake. not a violent shaking, but a very strange vibration. at that moment, the phone that was hanging on the bulkhead next to my desk rang. it was the third mate. he said, we re in trouble and i took off. hazelwood s ship had hit a two-mile underwater ridge, blye wreath. were alarms going off? when i got to the bridge, they were going off, yes. loud bells, sirens. when you heard those alarms, were you thinking, oh, my god? well, i had a pretty good idea we had run aground. i threw up in the toilet that was jet stream to the bridge when i got up there. why did you throw up? i felt like i had been kicked