Sense of safety among seafarers working onboard Finnish cargo ships: how seafarers feel about dangerousness of their profession?

Working conditions onboard cargo ships can be very challenging and contain many risks for seafarers. Depending on source, there is ten to twenty times higher risk for fatality than for any other industry. Purpose of this thesis was to find out do seafarers consider their profession more dangerous than average or not, and what seafarers think about the safety culture onboard. The literature used as reference for this thesis consisted of relevant scientific studies, articles and statistics. Results of this study are based on the questionnaire that was spread for relevant sample group. The study was limited to seafarers working onboard Finnish cargo ships. For this study a quantitative method was used. Results of the survey are presented with charts and explanations. Seafaring still showed to be dangerous profession according to statistics and majority of the seafarers participating on this survey. 70% of the respondents felt that seafaring is more dangerous profession than average and over 40% felt they are risking their health because of the choice of career. As major risks for health were seen fatigue and poor attitudes towards safety onboard. Over 30% of the respondents had been considering a change of career because of safety related problems onboard