Wallin, I appreciate your aircraft credentials, but you’ve made so many incorrect statements about boats in the general and the accident in particular, that you haven’t demonstrated knowledge about ships or information about this particular incident or the effect of wind age on large slab sided vessels. You have implied that the boat was operating at an unsafe speed, that the design of the vessel was foolish, that the boat made a sharp turn, that the crew may have been at fault and that wind doesn’t blow boats around. None of these things are correct or jibe with the facts. You said:

“As previously mentioned, 8 knots may be the limit operating speed for that area. If that is the case, then operating on the limit at reduced visibility and decreasing space is indeed "pushing it".

8 knots is not “pushing it” - it’s the proper speed to maintain steerageway when leaving port and transiting to open waters.

“But reports says they lost control, meaning the redundancy was not there, or the redundancy were all broken too, meaning they were operating a very unsafe vessel.”

The vessel was inspected before leaving port

“Makes one think. Who in his right mind would make a multi million dollar boat that can't be steered once the power is out, and make the steering worked only by one engine? That would be gross negligence on the designer, or gross negligence on the operator/owner of the ship, if they allowed it to travel with only one its system working”

As previously mentioned, and from information readily available, in addition to the main engine, large vessels of this size typically have 3 engines for generating electricity and one spare generator

“As for the captain to overrule the pilot who was managing the emergency, well, the pilot was there for a reason. He was the captain at that moment”

No, he was not. The Captain is the master of the vessel and AlWAYS has the final authority and responsibility. The pilot is there to aid in navigation.

“There is the human factor that can not be put aside. Sometimes, the routine makes one complacent, pushing things to their limit because nothing bad happened. He might have done that speed many times, unsafely and the dice roll just caught up with him. Who knows? Maybe he was under pressure to get to the shore as fast as possible or just getting a bad case of "gethometitis" that he disregard some safety buffers”

“One thing I know, A true professional equipment operator always take many things in consideration, topmost of which is safety. There is always a preparation or adjustments to the prevailing condition. A highway may be marked 100mph, but would you drive that fast in icy road conditions? Did the Pilot knew the ship is being operated without any safety backups for its system? If he knew, would he still run it at the allowed speed limit or would he creep that hulk into the harbor so that an anchor drop could stop it on time?”

Nothing was pushed to the limit, the speed was reasonable and appropriate and no one was going home - the vessel was LEAVING port. No safety buffers were disregarded and from the videos, we know visibility was good. The vessel lost electrical power due to an as yet unknown cause, and as a result lost propulsion and steering control. The vessel was being operated safely - safety and not running aground (staying within the marked channel) and avoiding collisions are always of paramount importance when leaving or entering a harbor.

“Not discussing the wind as it happened at dead of the night which normally have still air,”

As you will see from the images below, the wind at the vessel was 6.4 knots at the time.

“ I do not think the wind was not that strong on that night to veer the ship suddenly to the pillar if that is what happened."
The point there is the sudden course change just seconds to impact.”

Vessels this size do not “suddenly veer”. If you look at the images below of the vessel’s course, you won’t see any sudden “veering” what you are seeing are a number of recorded positions, so what appears to you as a sudden change in position is actually a gentle turn or drift. You’ll notice from the course chart that the course only deviated a few degrees after losing power - consistent with the effects od wind age and current.

“Ships do not necessarily gets blown about by the wind. Sailboats won't tack if that is true”

Ships of ALL sizes are influenced by the wind, especially tall, slab sided vessels like the Dali, and I don’t understand your comment about tacking. Wind is often changing and that goes for tacking as well. Modern sailboats are not blown forward by the wind except when running before the wind. On other points of sail, they are “lifted” by the sail, much like a vertical airplane wing, with the lateral force resisted by the keel.

And finally, since you have aeronautical experience, you should be familiar with this formula which calculates the force generated by the wind against a flat object (which the cargo stack on the Dali is):

The force of wind on a flat object can be calculated using the formula F = 0.5 x ρ x A x V2, where F is the force in Newtons, ρ is the density of air in kg/m3, A is the surface area of the object in square meters, and V is the wind speed in meters per second.

P=1.222. A =16,257 V=2.68. F= 26,600 newtons = 5,958 lbs

Makes one think. Who in his right mind would make a multi million dollar boat that can't be steered once the power is out, and make the steering worked only by one engine? That would be gross negligence on the designer, or gross negligence on the operator/owner of the ship, if they allowed it to travel with only one its system working.

As for the captain to overrule the pilot who was managing the emergency, well, the pilot was there for a reason. He was the captain at that moment. There is much to dig on that event that I'd not call it an accident, just yet.

Agreed, there are many different weights possible, depending if vessel is empty, ⅓ weight capacity loaded, ¼ weight capacity loaded, ⅛ weight capacity loaded, full weight capacity loaded, the density of the cargo being such the volume is fully capacity loaded, but cargo density is low enough the ship still does not settle to the plimsoll line....etc....

That wasn't the point I was trying to bring out.

I was addressing the contention of moving the loaded Dali laterally, by pushing it at the center with a tug that is a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of the weight and size and draft depth.
Trying to do that in 80 seconds, or less, was a time element I put in there, because going by the available videos, and publicly released timeline, it seems reasonable to expect that is all the time that was available from the point trouble was known to the point there was absolutely no time remaining to avoid collision.

If pushing those behemoths with a flea-sized tug at the center point of their length is the way to get the job done, it seems unreasonable to think the tuggers wouldn't be doing that after this many years of ........I dunno.......doing it wrong, I guess.

Maybe for a comparison, not necessarily to scale, but it may help get an idea.

Imagine yourself in a stream with a 120' long log, let's say, 8' in diameter. That log needs to be moved sideways to go through an opening between two pilings set in the river bed, but it is angled in the stream and heading toward one of the pilings, going off course, and it isn't very far from that piling.
At the speed it is travelling, it will be there in about 40 seconds.
Let's say it's only going 2.5 feet per second.

Now, you want to swim out there to the center of that log, push it straight sideways in the angled orientation that it has so it will go through that space between the pilings, without hitting either one, in less than 35-38 seconds.

If the way to sideways move, guide, control, shift, direct an object of 100,000+ tons, nearly one fifth of a mile long, whose lower edge is 40-50 feet below the surface of the water, using a little pusher of very diminutive size and weight, pushing only in the center of that wayward almost fifth of a mile long island, and get it done in 80 seconds or less, and not hit the.......

.......you're right !!!!!
They got nothing but numbskulls in those boats back there.....
......and after a few generations, they're only going downhill.

I hope you don't think that 8mph is a high rate of speed. The ships momentum (even at 8mph) would have carried it forward hundreds of yards after the loss of power. The pilot even gave the order to drop anchors but it doesn't look like that happened. The anchor dropping mechanism is totally manual and would not have been effected by the loss of power. This information was reported by FOX News. The "Black Box" carried by marine craft is very primitive compared to the "Black Box" on aircraft. The information recorded was not continuous information but snap shots taken a specific intervals. This information was reported by the head of the NTSB.

Years ago I read an article on a "breaker yard" in SE Asia. To save money they didn't use a dry dock, they waited for a very high tide and then with tugs and/or the ships engines got each ship up to max possible speed and ran them up the very wide and very slick sand & mud beach of a very low, flat shoreline as far as the momentum would carry them. Some made it so far they were above the tide line. Then work crews with cutting torches etc. swarmed over them until the last ton of metal went off to be melted and recycled.
With things as heavy as ships momentum is king.