Sverre Sanden, PhD student

Early morning of November 7th 2018, the frigate KNM Helge Ingstad was on its way south from the NATO exercise "Trident Juncture" together with three other frigates in a NATO force. The other frigates headed further across the North Sea, to Dundee on the east coast of Scotland.

At about four o'clock at night, KNM Helge Ingstad collided with the tanker Sola TS, which had just left the Sture terminal. The frigate suffered major damage and water intrusion, continued inland, and ground support approx. 10 minutes after the collision. The crew had to leave the vessel a little later, and were evacuated.

On board KNM Helge Ingstad were 137 crew members. Following the incident, these underwent personnel follow-up in accordance with the routines in the Norwegian Navy. As part of the Norwegian Navy's routine for follow-up, a psychological survey of the crew was carried out at three times during the year following the incident.

The main purpose of the study is to investigate the relationship between vulnerability and protection factors and post-traumatic symptoms over time. The PhD project will measure stress reactions at three different times (two to three weeks, six months and twelve months after the event). In addition, we have relevant information about mental health, expectations, assessments of skills, etc. mapped prior to the incident. This provides a unique opportunity to not only check for baseline mental health, but also to examine how various vulnerability- protective factors are related to post-traumatic symptoms over time. As part of this, the study will also investigate whether the different profiles that are found can explain differences in symptom development over time.

Professor Sigurd W. Hystad at the Department of Social Psychology, is the candidate's main supervisor. Professor Bjørn Helge Johnsen is co-supervisor on the project.