Because it is the right thing to do, and the NTSB thinks so too.
>> The problem is that there are a thousand merchant marine vessels operating right now that are all doing great > Are they tho?
In the sense that they haven't caused an accident yet, yes. But they are accidents waiting to happen and the owners simply don't care. It usually takes a couple of regulatory interventions for such a message to sink in, what the NTSB is getting at there is that they would expect the owners to respond more seriously to these findings.
>> The recommendation to inspect the whole ship with an IR camera had me laughing out loud. > Where did this come from?
Page 58 of the report.
And no, obviously I am not calling into question the whole of the NTSB's findings, it is just that that particular one seems to miss a lot of the realities involving these vessels.
> "Don't look for a villain in this story. The villain is the system itself, and it's too powerful to change."
I don't understand your goal with this statement, it wasn't mine so the quotes are not appropriate and besides I don't agree with it.
Loose wires are a fact of life. The amount of theoretical redundancy is sufficient to handle a loose wire, but the level of oversight and the combination of ad-hoc work on these vessels (usually under great time pressure) together are what caused this. And I think that NTSB should have pointed the finger at those responsible for that oversight as well, which is 'MARAD', however, MARAD does not even rate a mention in the report.