WELLINGTON – Errors by crew members caused a New Zealand navy ship sinks into reef off the coast of Samoa, where it caught fire and sankaccording to the preliminary conclusions of a military commission of inquiry published Friday.

The ship’s crew did not realize the autopilot was engaged, believed something else was wrong with the ship, and failed to check that HMNZS Manawanui was under manual control while it was remained heading towards land, according to a summary of the investigation’s first report. The full report has not been made public.

All 75 people on board the ship were safely evacuated when the boat sank about 1.6 kilometers (one mile) off the coast of Upolu, Samoa, in October. The ship was one of nine ships in the New Zealand Navy and the first the country lost at sea since World War II.

Authorities did not know the cause of the sinking at the time and Navy Chief Rear Admiral Garin Golding ordered a court of inquiry to investigate.

“The direct cause of the grounding was determined to be a series of human errors that resulted in the ship’s autopilot not being disengaged when it should have been,” Golding told reporters in Auckland on Friday. “The muscle memory of the person at the controls should have leaned towards that panel and checked whether the screen said autopilot or not.”

The crew “mistakenly believed that their inability to respond to direction changes was the result of a propellant control failure,” he said. A number of contributing factors have been identified, Golding said, including training, planning, supervision, preparation and risk assessment.

The Court of Inquiry is expected to continue until the first quarter of next year. Golding said that because human error had been identified as the cause, a separate disciplinary process would begin following the investigation.

Three crew members who were on deck when the disaster unfolded are likely to face such a process, Golding added. These were the officer who controlled the ship, the officer who supervised that person, and the ship’s commander. The navy chief did not want to name them.

“I want to reassure the New Zealand public that we will learn from this situation and that it is up to me, as chief of the navy, to regain your trust,” Golding said.

In the days following the sinking, New Zealand’s defense minister gave scathing reprimands of ‘misogynistic’ online commenters who made insulting remarks to the captain of the ship because she was a woman.

The specialist diving and hydrography vessel had been in service for New Zealand since 2019 and monitored the reef on which it ran aground.

The sinking has sparked fears in villages along the Samoan coast near the wreck over damage caused by the ship’s diesel spilling into the ocean. New Zealand officials have said since the sinking that most of the fuel had burned in the fire and no environmental damage had been recorded.

The current flow of fuel into the sea is a “slow, persistent leak” that divers are monitoring, Golding said Friday. Specialist equipment is to be transported by sea from New Zealand to Samoa, starting this week, to remove fuel and other potential pollutants from the ship.

New Zealand authorities have not made public their plans to remove the ship from the reef.

“It had an impact on our reputation,” Golding said. “We’re going to own it, fix it and learn from it.”