The Transportation Safety Board (TSB) says lack of planning, failure to pay attention to potential hazards, and lack of a lookout resulted in the October 2016 grounding and abandonment of the passenger boat Stellar Sea in Warn Bay, B.C.
The vessel, with 26 passengers and two crew members, was off Tofino for a day of bear-watching.
According to the report, it was a cloudy day and the water was choppy, adding that the master was navigating tricky, shallow waters in Fortune Channel while looking for wildlife at the same time.
He was also communicating with the company, the deckhand and the passengers.
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Eventually, the Stellar Sea hit a rock and went aground. Two passengers fell and suffered minor injuries.
The company sent two vessels to rescue the passengers.
Nine boarded the first vessel, but the ebbing tide caused the Stellar Sea to heel to port, and the rest had to abandon ship and move onto a rock.
“Planning did not include strategies to identify and mitigate the risks posed by navigating alone in a challenging marine environment, filled with numerous hazards, such as rocks, reefs and a large tidal range,” read a statement from the TSB.
The investigation also found the master lost “positional awareness” due to his use of binoculars trying to find wildlife along the shoreline.