But Synergy’s explosive growth and polished public image – its website boasts of a culture of safety and commitment to seafarers and the environment – has been punctuated by deadly mishaps over the years.
review of global maritime incidents, ship inspection data, casualty reports and other publicly available documents reveal accidents, dangerous equipment and a string of injuries and fatalities – the latest of which claimed six lives when the Dali crashed into and destroyed the Baltimore bridge in March.
Over the past five years alone, people have been crushed, asphyxiated, struck by mooring lines, ensnared in equipment, fallen overboard or otherwise killed or injured on Synergy’s watch,
In one such incident from June 2022, the crew aboard a Synergy-managed ship – the Nord Magic chemical-oil tanker – let two technicians enter an enclosed cargo hold without the necessary permit and without testing and decontaminating the air. Both men asphyxiated from a toxic concentration of hydrogen sulfide inside the hold, according to Danish maritime authorities. Although they were evacuated, both were declared dead at a nearby hospital.
Two months after that, in August 2022, a Synergy trainee on the bulk carrier Peter Oldendorff attempted to remove a 660-pound steel plate from a vertical stack of other heavy steel plates stored in the ship’s steering room. The entire stack fell and crushed him. He died at the scene, according to German authorities investigating the incident.
In April 2023, another Synergy-managed tanker – the Petite Soeur – collided with a dredger while shifting between berths at a port in the Philippines. The dredger sank, killing three of its crew and leaving two missing, according to multiple media reports.
At least 31 people have been injured, at least three have gone missing and at least 17 have died in incidents involving Synergy-managed ships since January 2019, USA TODAY found.
The numbers are likely an undercount because the industry lacks consistent reporting requirements, and the data that does exist is incomplete and scattered across multiple jurisdictions, not all of which make their information public.
“There is not a single database,” said Patrick J. Austin, a retired marine engineer with more than 40 years of industry experience who now does ship safety audits. “Everybody has different standards for when something gets reported. Some owners are more scrupulous than others with reporting it.”
Synergy’s track record is far from an anomaly. USA TODAY also examined the other nine largest global ship management companies and found that all had been involved in incidents causing injury and death in the same five-year time period.
Like Synergy, these companies operate as third-party contractors to manage someone else’s vessels. They supply and train crews, purchase provisions, oversee maintenance and ensure compliance with maritime rules and regulations.
Third-party ship management is a growing part of the maritime industry, said Capt. Ashok Pandey, a master mariner and associate professor of maritime business at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy.
“In today’s day and age,” Pandey said, “it would be difficult for you to find a pure ship owner who is doing all the other pieces of the supply chain and logistics on their own.”
Among these 10 largest ship managers, USA TODAY discovered 117 incidents since January 2019 in which people died, went missing or were injured.
Synergy had the most deaths, but it did not have the most incidents overall or the highest rate of ships reporting a death or injury in the past five years. Synergy ranked second in both categories with 18 total incidents and 2% of ships reporting an incident.
Four other companies had more injuries than Synergy. One competitor, Seacon, had the most, all of which came from one incident: In June 2022, a crane sling broke while loading a 25-ton tank of hazardous chlorine gas onto a Seacon-managed cargo ship in Jordan. The tank dropped to the deck of the ship and exploded. Thirteen people died and at least 250 were injured.
The commercial shipping industry is notoriously dangerous. Every year, thousands of incidents happen at sea and in port – dozens of which kill or maim sailors, longshoreman and bystanders. These episodes are rising as the industry scrambles to keep pace with the growing demand for global trade.
“I worry about maritime safety because I’ve seen the underbelly of the beast,” said Roland “Rex” Rexha, secretary-treasurer of the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association, the oldest maritime union in the United States. “These people deserve to go home to their families when they get off the ship. And that doesn’t always happen.”
To compile the data, reviewed thousands of incident reports and accident investigations available on the websites of two dozen major maritime agencies, including the U.S. Coast Guard and the International Maritime Organization housed within the United Nations. Reporters visited at least a dozen other maritime agency websites but found no such publicly available information.
The media organization also relied on Lloyd’s List Intelligence’s SeaSearcher platform, a subscription-based, global ship tracking and marine incident repository, to identify which vessels the companies and their subsidiaries managed during the five-year time period, as well as how many times port authorities detained their vessels for deficiencies and violations.
In addition, combed through other publicly available records to identify subsidiaries that SeaSeacher didn’t list. It is possible that some subsidiaries, and therefore some ships, could not be identified.
USA TODAY reviewed its methodology with several maritime experts who generally agreed it was appropriate.
“Considering there is no central repository for this information, that’s absolutely an accurate way to do it,” said a senior U.S. government official and former Coast Guard officer who spoke to USA TODAY on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.
Even the Coast Guard can’t get a hold of data” to see the full incident history of these companies or their vessels, he said. And when they ask other countries for it, “there’s no guarantee they’ll get a response.”
Synergy: It’s impossible to compare safety records
Synergy Marine Group acknowledged that it has had some “very unfortunate cases of death and man overboard,” but the company disputed USA TODAY’s overall findings and the results of its data analysis.
Given the industry’s lack of a single, comprehensive source for such incidents, company executives said that it’s impossible to accurately compare Synergy’s record to those of its peers.
Synergy executives further said it’s potentially misleading to report the number of incidents without explaining how or why they occurred. Anand Sashidharan, Synergy’s chief legal counsel, compared it to reporting a car accident without disclosing that the other driver might have been at fault.
“We firmly believe that any comparison of safety records must be qualitative and consider the broader context, including the organisational scale of operations (number of vessels under management) and other external factors,” said Vishal Srivastava, Synergy’s head of media and communications.
Srivastava said that Synergy, and the industry as a whole, has a goal of zero injuries or deaths, adding that they will “hopefully reach that stage soon.”
Notably, none of the incidents appear to have tarnished the company’s reputation or its continued growth. Synergy has added an average of 38 vessels to its roster annually since its inception. Not even the Baltimore bridge disaster broke its stride.
At the time of the March 26 accident, Synergy had managed 668 ships, according to an archived version of its website . As of Sept. 17, that number had grown to 686.
“They are hardly toxic,” Austin said, explaining that Synergy has valid documents of compliance confirming it meets a host of technical, safety and operating requirements, “without which no insurance company would insure them.”
In addition to interviewing Synergy executives, ship inspectors, maritime experts and other industry insiders, USA TODAY reached out to more than four dozen current and former Synergy sailors through social media, email or WhatsApp. Only three responded, including one who was aboard the Dali when it hit the Baltimore bridge.
Shershad Nadammal, a general steward whose duties include serving meals and keeping the ship’s quarters clean, has worked on Synergy vessels for about a decade. He said the company has a strong culture of safety and well-being for its seafarers and that, before this March, he had never witnessed or been involved in an incident.
“Accidents are very rare,” said Nadammal, 33. “Safety is the first priority of the company and crew.”
Synergy has taken good care of him and his shipmates since the disaster, Nadammal said. The company provided mental health counseling, food and arranged for many of the men to return home even as the investigation into what happened continues. Nadammal is now in India with his wife and young daughters and said he plans to sail with Synergy again.
“Synergy is a very good company,” he said.
Halfway around the world in Seattle, Murray and his family said their experience with Synergy could not have been more different.
As the severity of Murray’s injuries became clear, they found he could no longer work as a union longshoreman. His Harley Davidsons – once his pride and joy – became too dangerous to ride. And his wife, for whom he had always been the strong and competent patriarch, had to take care of him instead.
“I basically watched my big, Harley-riding, 220-pound husband become completely dependent on me,” said Elise Murray. “He was the kind of guy you always felt safe with, like a warrior, and here he couldn’t be trusted alone to even have a pot of boiling water on the stove without burning down the house.”
Although Synergy had full command of the APL Ireland, the ship where Murray was injured, the company did not own it – just as it does not own the Dali. Instead, it provided full technical and crew management of the APL Ireland for its owner, Southern Route Maritime.
The Murrays said they had assumed Synergy and Southern Route Maritime would take responsibility and compensate them for all they had lost.
Instead, the Murrays had to take them to court.
The companies waged a years-long legal battle denying liability. They said Roger Murray had no proof he was shocked by the ship’s floodlight, lacked the expertise to know whether he was shocked because he had never been shocked before and that his symptoms were unrelated to being shocked.
When a jury sided with Murray and awarded him $3.3 million – plus $270,000 to Elise for loss of consortium – the companies asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the verdict.
In August 2017, more than seven years after the accident, the appeals court upheld the jury’s decision. Murray said he was relieved to get justice but that he’s forever scarred.
“I thought after the accident that they would be fair,” he said. “But no, they were like a thief in the night; they came and stole my life.”
What makes global shipping so difficult to monitor?
Few people outside the global maritime industry had heard of Synergy before its ship took out the second-longest continuous truss bridge span in the world.
Like most ocean-going shipping ventures, Synergy operates largely out of sight, out of mind, until it’s involved in a disaster big enough to draw widespread attention.
Most people are not focused on how ship management works. They just want to know if their container arrived,” said the senior U.S. government official and former Coast Guard officer.
Even those who do focus on ship management, he said, find the industry frustratingly difficult to monitor and assess.
The global merchant fleet is owned by a maze of holding companies and subsidiaries scattered around the world. Ship owners spread their risk through layers of legal entities. Behind any vessel might lurk two or more companies with an ownership stake.
It’s even more complicated when ship management companies, like Synergy, get involved. Often, multiple ownership and management companies are tied to a single ship.
“Shipping is so old-school, and it’s so under the radar,” said Eric White, an inspector for the International Transportation Workers Federation, which represents transportation union members around the globe.
White’s job takes him aboard dozens of commercial vessels each year to ensure their crews have adequate pay, safe working conditions and decent living standards. He said he routinely finds the opposite.
“When you get down to it, nobody really knows who is behind all this,” White said.
Even one of the most venerable ship movement and incident tracking companies in the world – Lloyd’s List Intelligence – doesn’t have complete, up-to-date accounting of who owns or manages which ships and what kinds of problems those vessels have caused or incurred.
What’s more, a ship can change hands, change flags and change names multiple times over its lifespan, further obscuring its history or a particular company’s handling of it.
Within 10 months of Murray’s accident, for example, Southern Route Maritime, the Panama-based company that owned the APL Ireland, sold the vessel to Singapore-based Grace Ocean Private Limited – the same company that now owns the Dali. That sale ended Synergy’s management of the ship.
Since then, the APL Ireland has been sold and renamed three more times. It is now called the Adams and sails under the flag of Liberia for its Greek owners, who have a contract with Denmark-based Maersk.
“That’s how they hide their tracks,” Murray said, adding that it took his attorneys months to track down the vessel’s owner and operator to serve them court papers.
In theory, all ship owners and operators are subject to International Maritime Organization and International Labour Organization regulations.
In practice, though, enforcement of those rules falls to the individual nations where ships are registered – called “flag states” because ships fly the flag of their registry’s nation – and to the port authorities of the foreign countries they visit.
Some countries, like those in Europe and the United States, have strict enforcement standards. Others, including places throughout Africa and the Middle East, sources said, are more interested in bribes than safety standards.
Seafarers told USA TODAY it’s common for ships entering those territories to carry stashes of Marlboro cigarettes, Levi’s jeans and Jack Daniel’s whiskey – preferred bargaining chips – to pass unimpeded through their ports.
Eventually, though, a poorly managed or maintained ship is likely to get caught – especially if it enters a reputable port. Ships with especially serious violations can be detained by port authorities until those issues are resolved by the owners or – in the case they outsourced those operations – by the third-party ship managers.
Among the largest ship management companies, Synergy’s detention rate sits in the middle of the pack, USA TODAY’s analysis of Lloyd’s data shows.
About 8% of ships under its control over the past five years – or 63 vessels – have been detained at least once for reasons ranging from fire safety to maintenance issues to documentation problems.
One of them, the Bulk Finland, was held for more than two weeks in Belgium after an Aug. 8, 2022, inspection identified a laundry list of deficiencies. The inspector cited inadequate wages, rotten food, damaged crew accommodations and facilities, dangerous conditions, missing, expired and invalid documentation, inoperative safety equipment and a blocked fire escape, records show.
The bulk carrier remained in port until Aug. 24.
Days later, it was reflagged and sold to a new owner, which did not retain Synergy as the ship’s manager.
What are the risks to seafarers?
Synergy told USA TODAY that the company analyzes each mishap to identify root causes and implement preventative measures.
“Our proactive approach, including voluntary reporting and the adoption of best practices, Srivastava said, “demonstrates our dedication to the well-being of our crew and the integrity of our operations.”
After the 2022 asphyxiation deaths of two technicians on the Nord Magic, for instance, the company’s internal investigation led to a series of immediate actions and preventive measures to ensure “a similar incident does not reoccur,” according to a letter it shared with the Danish Maritime Accident Investigation Board at the time.
A similar incident, though, had happened at least once before.
In September 2019, a seafarer aboard Synergy’s Emilie Bulker passed out after entering an enclosed cargo hold without anyone testing the air quality or getting the proper entry permit. The hold contained palm kernel, known for its tendency to deplete oxygen and produce carbon monoxide in enclosed spaces.
Because the ship was docked at a port in New Zealand, local firefighters were called to rescue the man, who was taken to a hospital and made a full recovery. The country’s maritime authority also was alerted, launched an investigation and charged the ship’s captain and chief officer for lying about the incident.
The two men “gave false information claiming that assessment and gas tests of the cargo-hold had been done, and the hold was safe to work in,” the agency said in a press release issued two weeks later. “None of that was true.”
Both pleaded guilty to lying, and the captain additionally pleaded guilty to permitting dangerous activity.
“They’re task saturated,” said Austin, the retired marine engineer, referring to the industry as a whole. “The crews are very small, and the ships engaged in international trade are huge. You can’t micromanage it. It’s not possible to exert infinite control from shore. Once they’re out at sea, in reality, they’re their own boss.”
Synergy, like many shipping companies, relies on contracted seafarers to staff its ships. Most hail from lower-wage nations such as India, China and the Philippines. They are wooed by recruiting offices that promise safe working conditions, fair pay and on-site amenities such as free internet.
Once on board the ship, though, those promises may not materialize. Seafarers and union inspectors told USA TODAY about captains cutting corners to save time, maintenance deferred to save money and problems covered up to save face.
It’s an industry-wide issue, they said.
“It’s a corporate structure that rewards profit over safety,” said Rexha, the secretary-treasurer of the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association. “These vessels are falling apart in some instances. They go from port to port, and when they finally get in and things break down, it could be catastrophic.”
Seafarers subjected to these conditions are often afraid to speak up for fear of losing their contract or being blacklisted from the industry, many sources told USA TODAY. Unlike mariner unions in the United States, those in countries such as India offer relatively poor protection to their members.
“We’re the worst treated seafarers because of surplus supply and a very weak union,” said a former Synergy engineer from India who asked not to be named for fear that speaking out could hurt his future job prospects.
The engineer said ship management companies can feign ignorance about lapses in safety at sea and that, nine times out of ten, nothing bad ever happens because of it. But when it does, he said, it’s the crew that takes the fall.
“If all goes well, no one says anything,” he said. “One wrong thing, and you’re gone.”
How Synergy came to be
Synergy’s founder himself started out as a seafarer.
But his time at sea didn’t last long. Rajesh Unni’s meteoric rise – from deck hand at 18 to one of the world’s youngest ship captains at 26 – soon afforded him better opportunities.
Before he turned 30, Unni traded his sea legs for an executive job with Hong Kong-based ship management company, Fleet Management. With his help, the firm expanded its portfolio of some three dozen vessels to well over 100 within six years; today it’s the second-largest ship management company in the world.
Unni thought he could do it better, though.
“Having spent more than a decade in the ship management industry, I found that – despite high productivity costs – the level of service was still sub-par,” he told The Maritime Executive for a 2020 article. “The only way ahead was to continue to accept the norm or take a leap of faith and challenge the status quo.
So he left Fleet Management in 2006 and returned home to India to found his own company – Synergy Maritime Private Limited, now a subsidiary of Synergy Marine Group.
He started with contracts to manage just four ships. Now, less than two decades later, Unni’s sprawling enterprise oversees nearly 700 vessels – from oil tankers to bulk carriers to container ships – and boasts a state-of-the-art training center, recruitment agencies and investments in advanced technology and clean fuel.
Unni also moved Synergy’s headquarters from India, where it still maintains a strong presence, to the global maritime capital of Singapore.
Synergy did not make Unni available for an interview with USA TODAY and noted that he stepped down as chief executive officer in August last year to focus on broader strategic initiatives. Although he is still connected to the company, he is no longer involved in daily operations.
In previous interviews with other media outlets and in Synergy’s own newsletters, Unni has described himself as a seafarer at heart. And he has used his influence to lobby for seafarers’ rights.
During the coronavirus pandemic, for example, when travel restrictions blocked mariners from returning home after months at sea, Unni emerged as their outspoken champion. He led an effort that chartered flights to bring crews home.
To address seafarer suicides, which occur at a higher rate than many other professions, Unni marshalled resources to launch a free 24-hour mental health crisis helpline for the entire maritime community. It employed more than a dozen counselors covering nine languages.
Industry insiders feted Unni’s achievements along the way and bestowed upon him and his company a number of awards and accolades. Among them are “one of the most influential executives in global shipping,” as well as honors for “environmental achievement,” “outstanding foreign employer” and “operational excellence.”
In November, Unni and Synergy both were celebrated at an annual industry conference in Singapore. Unni took home a lifetime achievement award, while Synergy won ship manager of the year.
Four months later, a container ship under its management destroyed the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
A flood of lawsuits
The Dali lost power shortly before hitting the bridge, rendering its crew helpless as they drifted toward catastrophe. It also had lost power about 10 hours earlier, while it was still docked, according to a preliminary report released by the National Transportation Safety Board in May.
The report did not directly link the power outages or say whether the crew notified anyone of the first blackout, as required under U.S. rules and regulations that apply to all ships in its waters.
Last week, an official from the U.S. Department of Justice told USA TODAY the collision was “completely avoidable,” alleging that improper, makeshift changes to electrical and mechanical equipment on board the Dali led to its loss of steering.
National Transportation Safety Board investigators, along with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, are continuing to examine the vessel and the events leading up to the deadly incident. A final report could be months, or even years, away.
In the meantime, Synergy and the ship’s owner, Grace Ocean, filed a petition in the U.S. District Court of Maryland seeking to limit their financial liability for the accident to $43.7 million – the equivalent of the total value of the ship and its freight, minus the cost of repairs and salvage – in accordance with the Limitation of Liability Act of 1851.
That law allows the companies to limit their liability to the value of the vessel and its cargo when the losses resulted from a situation beyond their control. Synergy and Grace Ocean claimed the incident was not their fault; the city of Baltimore in a separate legal filing, disagreed.
If the companies prevail, they would pay a fraction of the estimated $3 billion to $4 billion in claims resulting from the bridge collapse.
A flurry of additional claims landed in federal court over the past week, leading up to Tuesday’s deadline to file in response to Synergy’s petition. Additional companies that had cargo aboard the Dali may respond to the petition over the next week, after the judge gave them extra time to submit claims.
Claimants currently include the families of six construction workers who perished, a survivor of the bridge collapse, and at least a dozen businesses alleging they’ve been economically harmed by the disaster – ranging from a Baltimore propane distributor to international shippers. The City of Baltimore, state of Maryland and the U.S. Department of Justice have also filed claims.
For Murray, the whole situation – from the denial of fault to the limiting of financial liability – feels eerily familiar.
“They wanted me to disappear,” Murray said, recalling how Synergy and Southern Route Maritime tried to settle for a fraction of what the jury ultimately awarded him. “We said, ‘no, uh uh.’ They think everyone can be bought up.”
Murray said his heart aches for the families of the deceased workers and he wishes them strength and luck as they seek compensation for their unimaginable loss. He described his own battle with Synergy as insult after injury – a secondary trauma that put him and his family through hell.
Although his sons were barely old enough to read at the time, he said, they remember Synergy.
“‘Dad,’” Murray said one of his sons asked while watching news coverage of the bridge collapse this spring, “‘isn’t that the company that hurt you?’”
