Finding 2, from two federal records joined

Does a change of operator go with a casualty?

Across 42,580 vessel-years, 2014–2021: yes, it goes with one. Which way it runs, the record does not say.

Changes of filed operator, against casualties

Filed operator, 2013–2023	Vessel-years	With a casualty	Rate	Lift
Never changed operator	34,546	8,077	23.4%	0.97
Changed once	6,680	1,734	26.0%	1.07
Changed two or more times	1,354	479	35.4%	1.46

Hulls that changed operator two or more times run 1.51× the rate of hulls that never did, against a base rate of 24.2% across all 42,580 vessel-years.

The same thing, holding hull age still

Hull age in that year	Never changed	Changed once	Changed 2+
under 20	22.6% (n=21,304)	24.4% (n=4,077)	33.7% (n=901)
20 to 34	20.6% (n=4,708)	19.3% (n=727)	— (n=108)
35 to 49	28.7% (n=5,680)	34.1% (n=1,399)	38.2% (n=262)
50 and over	24.6% (n=2,537)	26.7% (n=450)	— (n=83)

Older hulls change hands more often and appear in more investigations, so the first table could be age wearing the shape of operator change. Inside each age band the ordering holds. It is not purely age. A dash marks a cell with fewer than 150 vessel-years.

Which way it runs — the record does not say

Relative to a change of operator	Casualties
In the year before the change	278
In the year after the change	271

Close to symmetric. Casualties precede a change of operator at least as often as they follow one, so the record carries no direction, and neither reading of it is supported.

The biggest caveat

A change of filed operator is not proof of a sale. The Corps records who files the annual return; a change can be a restructuring, a bareboat charter, or a change in who files, with no transfer of the asset. This page counts changes in the filed record and calls them nothing else. It says nothing about any operator — no company is named, counted or compared here — and nothing about any vessel: Maury does not score, rate, or grade vessels.

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