Coast Guard Seaman Fired Over Instagram Video, Indecent Behavior

An unnamed former seaman of the Icelandic Coast Guard lost his case against the Icelandic state on Tuesday, June 29th. The case follows his dismissal from the Coast Guard and subsequent denial of compensation.

As Fréttablaðið reports, the seaman was fired for an Instagram post which the seaman took from the security camera of the ship. The video featured an incident in which a lifeboat nearly capsized.

With regard to the video, state attorneys said:

“In that video, there had been a mistake in unloading a lifeboat and from the video it can be deduced that it could have gone badly in that case. Such incidents should be reported to staff as a security breach and the case will then go through a proper process within the Coast Guard. The plaintiff’s conduct to take this video and publish it on social media with the comment ‘Near catastrophe’ seems to have had the sole purpose of underestimating security issues at the Coast Guard. It is a very serious matter that an employee of a law enforcement agency behaves in such a way.”

The seaman was formally reprimanded in 2018 for two incidents, the first involving showing up late and drunk to a watch shift in 2017, the other involving violent and threatening behavior at a gathering in 2018.

Correction: A previous version of this article stated that the person involved was an officer. Communications from the Coast Guard informed us that the person in question was actually just a seaman.

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