BC South Coast · Salish Sea (Burrard Inlet · Georgia Strait · Haro Strait · Juan de Fuca) · 1995–2026 · real TSB data
marker size ∝ vessel length · white ring = engine failure
The Salish Sea is one of the busiest waterways on the coast: ferries, tugs, cargo/container ships and the fishing fleet have engine failures, groundings and collisions here every year, close to Vancouver and Victoria. The Marathassa bunker spill (2015, English Bay) is highlighted. Bright, white-ringed dots are engine/machinery failures. Click a marker for the vessel, conditions and TSB summary.
Real data. Plotted from the Transportation Safety Board MARSISdb public occurrence + vessel views (the two CSVs provided), filtered to the BC South Coast / Salish Sea, 1995–2026, for ferry/passenger, tug, cargo-container and fishing vessels. The Marathassa (2015 English Bay bunker spill) is highlighted within the real data. Positions are as recorded by the TSB.
How to read this map. These dots show where incidents happened, not a formal incident rate. The TSB cautions that marine-occurrence data have statistical limits — modest annual totals, year-to-year variability, evolving reporting definitions, and the fact that many occurrences are recorded but not independently investigated. Incidents cluster where traffic is dense, so the Salish Sea's busy harbours and ferry lanes will naturally show more dots. This map is a consequence-visibility tool: it makes the everyday reality of engine failures, groundings and collisions in these crowded waters tangible, next to where a laden-tanker spill would put benzene plumes and oiled shorelines. (Rate-per-transit normalization from AIS traffic is a planned enhancement — see the roadmap.)