Metadish, Fresh from NYC

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The pilot, Richard Smith, who passed out at the helm of the Staten Island Ferry that crashed in 2003 killing 11 people was sentenced to 18 months in prison today.

The city’s former ferry director was sentenced to one year and one day in prison and was quoted as saying, "For my part of this, I’m so terribly sorry," as he addressed family members of the victims.

As the vessel approached Staten Island, Smith — suffering from extreme
fatigue and on painkillers — blacked out. The ship drifted and hit a
concrete maintenance pier at full speed, leaving dozens of passengers
maimed and injured amid shredded metal and broken glass.

Smith,
57, who fled the accident and tried to kill himself by slashing his
wrists, pleaded guilty in 2004 to negligent manslaughter. Ryan, 53,
pleaded guilty to related charges last year, admitting that he failed
to enforce a rule requiring ferries be operated by two pilots whenever
docking.

A recent report said that the incompetence went all the way up to the top.

The report concluded the city’s transportation department compromised
safety with shoddy oversight. It claimed the head of the ferry service
– a top deputy to the Department of Transportation Commissioner — was
completely unqualified, and questioned why he had escaped being charged
in the criminal case.

If the ferry director was charged, it seems that the Transportation Commissioner should have been charged as well.  Then again if we started charging every incompetent politician and their incompetent appointees of criminally negligent homicide, we’d practically have to elect a whole new government.

[WNBC]

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