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Selected Articles from Issue 29 August/September 2002
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Editorial Huge response to pilotage debate Talk about shooting the messenger. In the last issue, we published an article highlighting the issues surrounding the pilotage rules which are currently under review. This one article and the comment of who is in command or control provoked more in-depth letters than any other feature we have previously published. Unfortunately, many foreign-going masters of the old school are so passionate about their status in our industry that they chose to respond by shooting the messenger rather than focussing on the subject of the debate. However, we believe the subject is important, so we have devoted considerable space in this issue to the debate. While not wishing to be contentious, we have opened up the debate surrounding the use of drug and alcohol by seafarers at sea. It is unfortunate that the focus of this debate centres around one small section of our coastal fishing industry. This by no means implies that the rest of the industry is squeaky clean. In fact I am disheartened to learn that other sections of our industry, from charter-boats to coastal shipping, suffer from varying degrees of drug and alcohol abuse among its seafarers. And we appear to do nothing about it. In saying this, we must recognise the zero tolerance approach taken by the owners and training providers of our deepwater factory fishing fleet. As if drugs and alcohol are not a dangerous enough mix when added to seawater, just add guns and we have a potential recipe for disaster at sea. I kid thee not. Some of the stories we have heard, even if they are only half-true, are horrific, and beyond comprehension. We can only wonder how normal, law-abiding seafarers are able to stand and watch the event take place and be reluctant to react for fear of retribution. Another issue facing all the sectors of our coastal industry is the continued establishment of marine protected areas, for whatever purpose. One must question the credibility of some supporters of marine reserve proposals when DoC may approve their appointment as a concessionaire to operate commercially in the reserve. The new Marine Reserves Bill which is currently before the House will allow the environmental sector to apply and create further marine reserves and protected areas at a pace public stakeholders will have difficulty keeping track of. The Greens are quick to take the moral high ground and accuse commercial and recreational fishers of adopting a negative stance towards marine reserve proposals. And yet when you talk with these fishers, they are quick to respond that they are not against marine reserves, per se, but marine reserves need to be considered in the context of all marine protected areas. Consider the vast area of coastline and seabed which is already excluded to fishing, including the cables and pipelines protected areas, marine farms, marine reserves, defence exclusion areas, taiapure and mataitai, and shipping lanes, to name a few. Added together they form a significant part of our coastline which is already locked up for valid reasons. We are in dire need of the establishment of the new Oceans Policy, and further marine protected areas must only be implemented after considering its compatibility with the Oceans Policy. The Greens tell us that they want 20 percent of the coast. Labour will settle for 10 percent in marine protected areas. While the commercial industry could be forgiven for being gun-shy, the public is frequently wondering what the hell is happening. Behind all this is a growing concern from both the public and politicians about the appropriateness of the Department of Conservation's involvement in the establishment of new marine reserves. ACT has come out clearly in its election campaign and stated that DoC should remain responsible for DoC's estates and reserves, and should not be in the business of adjudicating or creating marine reserves because of their inherent internal conflict. Only after a national park or marine reserve has been established should it become DoC's responsibility. Of equal concern is the proposal to remove the concurrence approval from both the ministers of fisheries and transport in the new Marine Reserves Bill. In effect this means that if you miss the public consultation of any notified proposal, for whatever reason, you will no longer be able to raise the subject with the ministers of fisheries and transport highlighting any adverse or undue affect the proposal might have on your existing rights of access or usage. But it's not all bad. The magazine continues to grow, and this issue is chock full of industry reading, from workboats to accident reports. Keith Ingram, Editor |
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Captains respond to pilotage rules debate The article Pilotage rules come under discussion, featured in the last issue, has certainly created comment, much of it in defence of pilots. The letters were long and often laboriously technical. In the interests of the debate, we have reprinted three examples where the authors focused on the discussion and refrained from shooting the messenger. I have reserved my response at the end. - Editor Master always in command Dear Sir I wish to bring to your attention an error in your article Pilotage rules come under discussion. In the article, you state: "It is widely recognised that once pilots step onto the bridge that they take control once the hand-over documentation is completed, and they are in fact in command of the vessel." No, this is not correct. The master is always in command. For your assistance, I have included the definitions from the draft Rule 90B. "Command", or "charge" means being the master of a ship. "Control", "conduct", or "con", means determining a ship's heading and speed; and includes controlling the use of its propulsion, thrusters, steering, ropes, wires, fender, anchors; the use of wind, tide and currents; and the use of harbour tugs. Please be advised that once the master hands over the con of the vessel to the pilot, the statement Vessel to Master's Orders and Pilot's Advice, or VTMO&PA, is written in the log book. I hope this clarifies the situation between Command and Control. Steve Parker Chain of command Dear Sir I read with interest your article in issue 28 of Skipper magazine. I reply as a New Zealand harbour pilot - but in a personal capacity unassociated with any port company. I start with your second area of concern - the responsibility and accountability of the pilot. I only wish what you say was that simple. It isn't. First of all, your statement that "It is widely recognised that once pilots step onto the bridge that they take control once the hand-over documentation is completed, and they are in fact in command of the vessel" is wrong both in law and practice. This is so both nationally and internationally. The only place (where) that happens is, to the best of my knowledge, the Panama Canal. Having said that, your error is one often encountered; it is also one often found by some to be conveniently misunderstood. When a pilot comes onto the bridge of a ship there is no change of command - either in fact or by inference. The command of the vessel always remains with the master of the vessel. The pilot always remains merely as an advisor to the master in matters relating to local navigational matters. That is why, when a pilot comes to the bridge of a ship, the watchkeeping officer makes the notation in the deck log CVTMO - or Courses Various to Master's Orders. Alternatively it is sometimes written Courses Various to Masters Orders on Pilot's Advice. That is mealy-mouthed of course. A pilot is essentially charged with conducting the vessel from here to there with safety, efficiency and without delay. He or she does so with the expected and required full assistance and involvement of a bridge team organised by the master. There is never any change in command of the vessel. What pilots do adopt, once the handing-over procedures have been properly dealt with, is, to very varying degrees, the CONDUCT of the vessel. The difference is far more than mere semantics - and it has absolutely nothing to do at all with "valid concerns some pilots may have about visiting ship's standards of maintenance". The aim of the pilotage is to progress the vessel as safely as possible from the area generally outside the port to the berth. This is generally the most potentially hazardous part of a vessel's voyage. With this in mind, both the master and the pilot offer each other certain services with a view to progressing the safe passage of the vessel. The pilot offers ability and knowledge of currents and tides, expertise in navigating in close proximity to land and other vessels, an understanding of local traffic and traffic systems, language ability with shore services, tugs and linesmen, proficiency in ship handling in local conditions, and support to the ship's navigators, who may need navigating assistance. The pilot also offers support to the master, who is likely to be fatigued. In turn, the master is responsible for providing a safe and fully functional vessel, ship handling data and information, and a competent navigational team to monitor the progress of the vessel and which is prepared to question the pilot at any time about anything with which they have a concern. The article's argument that statistics show that piloting in New Zealand is unsafe is time-worn and ultimately self-serving. Of course if accidents are going to happen then, it is most likely, and perhaps most unsurprisingly, that they will tend to occur in pilotage waters. After all, that is when ships and land are at their closest proximity. That is why vessels generally do not have, or even need, pilots in oceanic waters. Having said that, I accept of course that there have been occasions when the piloting has been clearly at fault. But I would point out that such pilotage failure is as much a failure of the bridge resource management system, for which the master and pilot have equal responsibility at the outset of the pilotage. The article comments further on port authorities' requirements on minimum tonnage limits for compulsory pilotage. You suggest that port authorities could be seen as revenue collecting. The article is non-specific as to what is meant by "port authority", but I presume from the tenor of the article that you refer to port companies. Some background is necessary here, I think. As you are no doubt aware, in 1988 the Port Companies Act separated the statutory and commercial arms of the old harbour boards. The statutory or regulatory arm remained with the harbourmaster (an employee of the local regional council), while the commercial arm moved into the ambit of the newly established port companies. Harbour pilots, who were once employed by the harbour board under the auspices of the harbourmaster, were transferred to the employment of the local port company. Safety of navigation within a harbour remained (and still remains) the responsibility of the harbourmaster - not the local port company - which is nothing more than a common user of the harbour. Pilotage exemptions continue to be granted by the harbourmaster - not by a port company, which in itself has no direct influence over the set exemption length limits. Having said that, port company pilots are often used as a pilotage exemption examining body because it is convenient for the harbourmaster to use the available expertise. Port companies do not gain or lose revenue as a result of their own decision making as to what is, or what is not, an appropriate pilotage exemption length. Rather, they gain or lose revenue as a result of decision making by the harbourmaster who is not associated with the port company - except so far of course that the regional council may be a statutory shareholder of that port company. At the end of the day, it is the harbourmaster who is responsible for the safe navigation of vessels within his/her harbour, and it is him/her who decides an appropriate exemption policy to reflect that safety responsibility. The article further comments on a perceived "accountability" of the pilot and their employer port company (if any) in the event of damage occurring to a vessel, berth or environment. You are, however, non-specific as to what you mean by "accountability" - presumably you mean financial accountability, since I am sure that you are aware that pilots, like any other mariners, are subject to prosecution in the event that the pilot contravenes the law. In such circumstances, wide-ranging penalties can be enforced against them. The question of financial accountability, however, is far more problematical. Section 8 of the Maritime Transport Amendment 1999 inserts a new section 60B into the Maritime Transport Act 1994. In line with international law and practice this states (abbreviated) that port companies are not liable for any neglect or want of skill of the pilot provided by them; that the pilot is similarly not liable while acting as a pilot; and that the master or owner is answerable for any loss or damage caused by the ship in circumstances where pilotage is required. This is quite clear. Your article, however, suggests that this law is in error for reasons that are not made clear - but seem to be grounded in some perception of unfairness, rather than as a "fix" to any particular existing problem. When a vessel causes damage to another vessel, a berth or the environment, a call goes out for two things. Firstly, find the person to blame and take the appropriate action against them; secondly, assign financial responsibility and obtain financial recompense for the damage so caused. One might suggest that the latter is generally far more important in the long term than the former. The current situation is that the vessel's insurers would cover the costs involved - providing the essential certainty of recompense. Financial recompense could alternatively come from either of two other sources. Firstly, it could come from the pilot, which appears to be the suggestion of your article. Harbour pilots in New Zealand are not paid at a level that would make it worthwhile for the plaintiff to attach any action. Assets are likely to be limited to the family home, the car or cars, maybe a boat, and sundry other odds and ends which are hardly likely to be sufficient to satisfy practically the tens or hundreds of thousands (or millions) of dollars needed to meet a judgment. In the event that the law was changed, then it is most probable that pilots would either leave the profession, or alternatively place their assets in trust to make them unavailable, in such a way that any business would. They could not afford not to. Either way, financial recompense would not be forthcoming. In such circumstances it is unlikely that ships would enter New Zealand ports, since the probability of recompense for any damage caused would be zero. Private pilotage companies would cease to exist because of the high insurance premiums needed to cover any potential claims. Secondly, the recompense could come from the employer of the pilot. I am not properly placed to discuss port companies' business, but it would seem to me that a port company might either choose to pay the full amount, or might choose to restrict its liability and pay a lesser amount In the former case, it would seem that there would likely be a need to increase its insurance premium levels to cover potential claims - such additional costs needing to be covered by additional revenue. In the latter case, damage costs would not be covered in full, which might leave the ship open to the costs not covered by the port company. In this situation there would need to be a balance in premiums between the port company and the ship owner. All port companies would be likely to be in the same position - thus raising the cost of imports and reducing the revenue from exports. The effect, therefore, would be merely to transfer the insurance premium costs from the ship's insurers to the people of New Zealand. Since these insurance costs are already being met through raised freight costs and increased internal prices, the net effect of changing the system would be nil. A non-existing problem would be met with a non-changing solution. Finally, your article seems to adopt the tone that pilotage services are a moneymaking activity to be indulged in at a whim by port companies. I suggest that you are far from the truth. Pilotage is concerned with safety - not money making. This is why private pilotage companies throughout the world which operate in a "maximising profit/maximising safety" environment have generally met with ill fate. In an ideal environment (such as Wellington), the harbourmaster remains totally disassociated from the port company. The harbourmaster's decisions as to pilotage exemptions and compulsory pilotage are arm's length decisions for which, rightly, the harbourmaster incurs no cost nor gains any revenue. The local port company then offers a pilotage service commensurate with the local harbourmaster's required level of harbour safety at a level that does incur costs and gain revenue. This revenue then becomes a cost to a ship owner or manager, whose non-exempt master is required to meet the required level of harbour safety. The master expects the pilotage service to provide his or her vessel with a safe transit to a berth. He or she is not essentially concerned with the pilotage cost but with the safety of his or her vessel - that cost focus is, and always has been, the prerogative of ship owners and ship managers, who often see themselves as having different underlying imperatives. The master/pilot (or employees) relationship is essentially one of safety. The ship owner/port company (or employer) relationship becomes essentially one of cost. This is because, at the end of the day, pilotage in New Zealand is recognised internationally as being essentially safe, and arguments to the contrary are seen as self-serving. Of course, where harbourmasters are not completely separated from port companies, it might be reasonably argued that decision making as to harbour safety and associated pilotage requirements may not be at arm's length. Port companies are also statutorily required to act as successful businesses, and it is a legitimate argument that part of that business is the protection of its assets, together with the revenue that flows from them. Damage to wharves and vessels is unacceptable at any level, and port companies have, I believe, a legitimate right to take such action as best safeguards those assets - always provided that their provision of pilotage services is within the law and not anti-competitive. It is true that harbour pilots are forced to operate in a local commercial environment, but their services remain focussed essentially on safety and the prevention of environmental damage. In so doing, I believe that they serve not only their employers but also the people of New Zealand. William Corbett Potential problems Dear Sir I work on a seasonal basis as a skipper on vessels of less than 500 gross tonnes. Like many skippers, I learnt to navigate and handle vessels by working my way up through recreational and commercial boats of all types. Many of these boats I have owned. Others, like my present (relatively) larger vessels, I skipper professionally - using my "certificate of competency", and I have on occasion been obliged to pick up pilots. I therefore feel I can speak on the problems of pilotage for ships of less than 500 gross tonnes in New Zealand. Firstly, in fairness, most harbour pilots are generally quite good. But I am a good pilot too, and so is my crew. Therefore when a pilot is put on board there is usually nothing to be gained from it. In fact, you pick up potential problems along with picking up a pilot: The most obvious problem is the confusion over divided command and who is driving. If the lawyers and safety authorities can't decide clearly and unambiguously who does what when a vessel has a pilot on board, how can a poor skipper know in the middle of berthing? If you doubt there is confusion, just read the letters in the magazines - where people can't even agree in those magazines. In practice, of course, we manage the situation to ensure the safety of the ship, but pilots are an additional pressure and workload at exactly the wrong time. You are also picking up an unknown quantity when you would prefer to be working with your own bridge team. Sure, bridge resource management is there to be used. But if BRM is sold as a solution to this problem, why not just avoid the problem and the extra work and aggro in the first place, and keep the BRM for the onboard team and for communicating with the support available from radio stations and harbourmasters - that's how you update on berths, traffic, and hazards. It costs, too - a lot. Pick up a pilot for a couple of hours and you get handed a bill for several hundred dollars. That's a week's pay for most crew, or a week's profit for most owners. On an ongoing basis, it can be the difference between an operation succeeding, and employing crew, or laying up the boat and paying off the crew. If I had a thousand dollars to spend on board, I would like the right to choose whether I wanted to pick up a pilot for an hour, employ a local fisherman as a live-on-board guide for a week, or send one of my officers on an STCW upgrade course or a BRM course. There is a lot better value I could get for my safety dollar. If you use pilots all the time, you and your crew will lose the edge on your currency and confidence that you are going to need when your next port has no pilots. And you can be sure that the more remote, or harder, or less charted the port, the less chance of pilots. And of course, if the weather is bad, or the port is busy with big ships, you are usually "allowed" to do it yourself anyway. For example, as Wellington Harbour chart NZ 4633 says, "The inner pilot boarding area will only be used when (the) weather is too bad to use the outside boarding areas!" Taking a pilot may also limit you or your owner's choice of ports. Port A may have a simple, safe approach, yet will cost you several hundred dollars to carry a pilot. Port B, next door, might be far more dangerous and difficult and environmentally sensitive, yet have no pilots. As long as you can plan to enter Port B safely, then Port B it will be. The standard pilot qualification is a deep sea master's ticket. Pilots therefore tend to come from big ships, where as captains they did little of their own pilotage. In fact, many pilots were just ordinary officers who would have had even less experience. When they get a job as a pilot, they start on small ships and work up to bigger ships. So when a ship of less than 500 gross tonnes is obliged to use a pilot, what you can get is someone who has less experience than a good skipper, and who has been put on board to build their own experience at someone else's expense and risk. There are also practical problems. Picking up pilots is another factor to consider in entering and leaving port. You have to time your entry or departure to the pilot's availability. Build in a safety factor, and you are hanging about unnecessarily. Run behind schedule, and you are into paying the pilot overtime. You have to mix it at the pilot station with bigger ships you would otherwise avoid, and have another boat, almost as big as you are, come alongside in a seaway to transfer the pilot. If that needs a pilot ladder, and heaven forbid if you have not used it for a while, and it does not meet all the pilot ladder rules, then, like many fishing boat skippers, you are going to get several thousand dollars of fines and a criminal record. Following on from that, as skipper you are liable to all sorts of fines for breaches of the pilots' rules you probably don't even know of, such as flying the right flags. Yet conversely, if your pilot ignores your orders, goes berserk and sinks your Russian passenger liner, then you and your crew go to jail, and the pilot just walks away. Having said all this, pilots do have specialised local knowledge and skills. There are times when a skipper should consider using them: You and your crew could be injured or ill You and your crew could be fatigued, and stopping or anchoring to rest might not be an option, although you need to be able to trust the pilot, or you are just adding to your workload. There could be language problems in a strange port, although you need to be careful that using the pilot as a translator does not take you out of the loop. You might have lost so much of your navigation and communication equipment, including traditional backups, that you need local shore assistance. You could, and this is very much for real in some nasty countries with military, political, or piracy problems, need a (hopefully trustworthy) local person on board as a first line of protection against officialdom or pirates. Unfortunately, there are just far too many variables involved to be able to have rigid rules that say when ships under 500 gross tonnes must pick up a pilot. If you say non-New Zealand registered ships must take pilots, you disadvantage not just overseas ships (which may retaliate with similar pilotage laws against New Zealand in their own countries), but New Zealand skippers on what are really New Zealand ships, but are for some business reason registered offshore. If you say you must take pilots at bar harbours, you disadvantage ships when the tide and the weather is right, and you are in communication with the shore, and conditions are perfect. If you say you must take a pilot on your first visit to a port, you disadvantage the skippers and crew who are experienced and who specialise in visiting new places, and you ignore the advances in charting, communications, navigation aids and on-board BRM, and modern, manoeuvrable ships. If you try, with the best will in the world, to make detailed rules that say when a small ship must pick up a pilot, you will be carrying pilots unnecessarily, incurring all the disadvantages of carrying a pilot, incur unnecessary expense, create ill-feeling and achieve nothing. When the ship then reaches a port where pilotage is optional, and the skipper feels that this time, because of the particular circumstances, when they would choose to use the services of a pilot to augment the bridge team, they will hesitate. Pilots will have been seen as an unnecessary expense, and there will be a history of friction. They may even feel that when they had to carry pilots, the pilots proved unnecessary. So if they are not required to carry pilots, there must be absolutely no need for them. "Wolf!" will have been cried. As a professional skipper, I do not want to be told when I must pick up a pilot and what I must allow him or her to do on my ship - all at my own risk, of course. That is exactly the same as if you arrive at a town in your car and are told that because you have a Japanese car, or your car is more than 500cc, or the town is dangerous because it has a petrol station or a set of traffic lights or a bus stop, or because you have not been there for a month, or simply because, without consulting you or any other car owners, the local taxi drivers have lobbied the local mayor, you are to move over and let a local bus driver (who has never owned a car himself) take over the driving. And they need notice of when you are arriving in town, and if you are early then you just wait outside town until morning. If the local driver breaks the speed limit, damages your car or anything or anyone else, it will be you who will get the speeding fine, pay for the damage, lose your insurance no-claims, have your driving licence endorsed and go to jail. Oh, and that will be $700 for you to pay the local driver, please. For the bureaucrats, another example would be to think of pilots as consultants - which they are. Choosing to use the specialist skills of consultants is good and standard practice. But what chief executive officer or organisation would accept laws that required them to employ consultants to do tasks and make decisions for them, instead of allowing the CEO and organisation to use, or choose to use, its own skills. And further, what CEO or organisation would accept laws that made them completely responsible for the actions of the consultants others had told them they had to use - and had to pay for. As a professional skipper with a professional crew, I want to be able to assess the variables of each and every situation myself, and decide whether or not I need to augment my bridge team with a local specialist. I do not want the baggage of the expense, risk, and aggravation of having been carrying unwanted pilots in past ports. I want to feel free to choose to employ a pilot when necessary, and how to best use the pilot in my bridge team. If necessary, I would like to feel free to ask the pilot, as a fellow master, to take over the pilotage. Conversely, if a pilot had the con, and I felt it necessary, I would like to feel free to take the con back, knowing it was fully legal to do so and that I could legally continue the pilotage. I would like to feel that my crew and I had enough opportunity to do pilotage ourselves to be current and confident, and capable of taking the con back from any local pilot in situations that, by definition, would be when there were problems to resolve. Finally, as a professional skipper, I would like any pilot I choose to employ to be a fellow professional, and carry the same professional responsibility as my crew and me. Whatever responsibilities pilots shirk get added to my responsibilities. A skipper has enough responsibilities of his or her own, without taking upon themselves the additional responsibility from a pilot, especially when that was a pilot they would not choose to carry. Relieving Master Who is in control or command? Firstly, I would like to thank the many ship's masters and engineers who took the time to write or ring me during this past month to correct a comment made in the last issue of Professional Skipper pertaining to pilotage rules. Of united concern was my statement "But once they (pilots) accept control, they are in effect in command, and therefore should be held responsible and accountable". Control versus command! I still say that given the above, and the fact that by Maritime Safety Authority records we have had at least 18 accidents, incidents or mishaps in the past four years while the pilot was in control, the pilot is still in effect in command, call it control if you will. Either way, as a professional, the pilot should remain accountable for his or her decisions while in control. I was disappointed that you were united in your silence as to why we now appear to be having a spate of groundings when the master has trusted his faith and ship into the hands of a qualified pilot, or the trend down to 100 tonnes for pilotage. Only one master and retired pilot, whom I have the utmost respect for, was prepared to comment on the 500 tonne issue. In fact I understand he was instrumental in getting the limit lifted to 500 tonnes years ago, and was appalled with the prospect of going backwards, especially with our now well-lit navigational harbour channels and modern technology. More importantly, the New Zealand shipping industry over 500 tonnes, as we know it, is all but dead. So when the proponents of this discussion decided to have their meetings, it would have been nice had they extended the basic courtesy of inviting the fishing and coastal shipping industry under 500 tonnes along. After all, it will be these operators who will be most effected. However, the facts remain, and given the number of letters received, I will endeavour to state my thoughts a bit more clearly. Command/control. Pilots do not have command, and readers are correct in saying so. But having said that, it is relevant that outside this particular debate, when the media is interviewing pilots, they do tend to talk of taking command. One recent example was in the Wellington press, when "Captain" Smith took "command" of that recent biggest container ship to visit the port. Again, if a master is told they must use a pilot, and the pilot tells the master that the pilot must control (or whatever the word is), the ship, and it's the pilot who decides the course, speed and where and when and how and even if the ship berths, then whatever word is used, the pilot is in effect in command of that part of the ship's operations. But the important thing is the obvious ambiguity and debate. If it cannot be determined with clarity in an industry debate, or in the columns of a professional magazine, with time and peace to consider, what command and control mean, and who does what, then how on earth can an individual skipper/master know who is in command or control of their ship during the most critical parts of their passage? For safety, a ship must have someone in charge, and unambiguously in charge of the ship and the rest of the bridge team and crew - not two people in charge and not no-one in charge. I understand what Part 90 is attempting to do is resolve this dangerous ambiguity once and for all. Having decided who is in charge (whatever word is used), whoever has responsibility must have the authority to meet that responsibility, and whoever has the authority must have the responsibility. The two go together. One person must unambiguously have both authority and responsibility. It is as simple as that. It was a similar iniquity, taxation but no representation, which caused the American colonies to fight for, and win, their independence from Britain. Regarding Captain Parker's letter in support of pilotage reform from the upper end of the industry, the critical point is that the definitions he quotes are not currently in existence, but are proposals to resolve the very problems under discussion. They are a proposed solution to the ambiguity, not the reality. If they become a reality, using those terms in a defined sense will allow the ambiguity of who is in command, and the iniquity of responsibility not being aligned with authority, to be resolved. VTMO&PA is traditional on deep-sea ships and will be in use on Silver Fern tankers. But on most of the ships in New Zealand no-one even knows how to spell the expression, and the bottom line is that all it does is perpetuate the ambiguity. If a pilot says "Starboard", is that really advice to consider, or a helm order to be obeyed? Maybe a solution is to refocus more specifically on "Command of the navigation of the vessel." Captain Keith Ingram. Editor... |
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NEWS
The Black Bart is going nowhere. The High Court is to appoint a broker to sell her to repay debts, even though she is loaded with $88,000 of diesel for a service station owner in the Chatham Islands. The men flew out after the Philippines Embassy forwarded money provided by the recruitment company which posted the men to the ship. Kathy Whelan, a coordinator with the International Transport Federation, said she was confident of the ITFs resolve to pursue their claim for more than $95,000 in unpaid wages. She said the sailors had been shocked by a plea from their master to stay on board so the Black Bart could be sold as a going concern. The master, Captain Helmut Lohmann, said the ship would be hard to sell without a crew, but it was better that they go home rather than stay unwillingly. Once a buyer is found, the men will be paid as preferential creditors. The Black Bart was formerly the Ngamaru 3 before receivers of the failed Cook Islands National Line sold her last year. She had been the main supply ship to the Chatham Islands since the early 1990s, as well as serving more tropical ports. - NZ Herald |
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An anatomy of
a shipwreck by Skipper's international correspondent, Hugh Ware Giant swells drive ship ashore. Oil soils beaches. Ship refloated. Those headlines described a recent stranding of a sizeable cargo carrier in New Zealand and the subsequent salvage effort ... But what was behind those headlines? Below, complied from government press releases, news accounts, various websites and personal communications is a preliminary chronology. It reveals both the events as they were perceived while they happened, and the decisions people made as they wrestled with each new problem. The final reports of investigatory groups should list a cleaner flow of events and decisions.
It is early February 2002, and mid-summer at Gisborne, a small city on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island. By nightfall of February 6, the harbour is being slammed by giant easterly swells remaining from a mid-summer "southerly" a few days earlier. The storm had hammered the east coasts of both New Zealand islands, and is later described as producing the "worst sea conditions in 30 years", while the MSA later characterises the swells as "the worst we have seen in many years." Gisborne's small port, at the entrance to the Turanganui River, is part way round the broad, sweeping arc where Poverty Bay indents the North Island's east coast. A breakwater protects it. The channel is 10.4m deep at low water, 91.5m wide, and 0.6 miles to the entrance buoy. The wharves and piers are in a direct line with the channel entrance. Much of the port's exports consist of radiata pine logs, mostly to South Korea and Japan. The 156m Jody F Millennium has been loading a cargo of logs. The two-year-old general cargo carrier is Korean-manned, Korean-operated (Hyundai Merchant Marine), Japanese-owned (Soki Kisen), and flies a Panamanian flag. She has 22,000 tonnes of logs in her holds and on deck, and a further 4400 tonnes remain to be loaded. Wednesday, February 6. Five-metre swells smash against the Jody F Millennium, finally breaking five wire mooring lines. The small harbour tugs Titirangi and Turihaua try to pin the vessel against the pier, but someone (news reports later identify the port authorities and the ship's master, while other reports identify the pilot boat's operator and the ship's master) decides that the ship should put to sea. The time is about 2200 hours. The swells are running 5m high, the ship draws 10m, and the channel is 10.4m deep at low tide. It is two hours after low tide, and the tidal range is 1.5m to 2.1m. With the pilot boat leading the way, the pilot takes the Jody F past the channel's end, where he boards his launch, while the Jody F continues on her way. One or more swells then drive her out of the channel and hard aground. The vessel drops her anchors. The rudder is probably damaged, perhaps by the vessel bouncing off the channel bottom. The crew of 19 safely rides out the action. Thursday, February 7. During the night, the Jody F has dragged her anchors some 490m and is now parallel and upright and aground on a muddy/sandy bottom about 1525m off Waikanae Beach in 8m of water. She is heading approximately east-west with the bow to the west, and she may be resting on an anchor. No oil seems to be leaking out, and the crew is staying aboard. The swells continue to hammer the ship but with diminishing force, and are now 0.91m to 1.9m high. Reports state the vessel carries 694 tonnes of heavy fuel oil plus 66 tonnes of diesel oil. Federal authorities hold an emergency meeting at 0600 hours, and by noon, the head of the New Zealand National Oil Spill Service Centre is on the scene and is appointed the national on-scene commander. Salvors fly in from Australia. The two parties must solve separate problems: a possible oil spill and cleanup of the resultant pollution, and refloating the ship. The New Zealand government is responsible for the oil and its effects, and starts assembling resources from New Zealand and Australia. These include dispersants, inflatable "barges," skimmers and floating booms. Some booms are deployed to protect several rivers and the harbour area. A Sydney company, United Salvage Pty Ltd, is responsible for salvaging the ship and her cargo. Preliminary estimates are that many logs and most of the oil may have to be removed before the vessel can be refloated. But the salvor's first job is to keep the ship from being driven further up the beach, or moving and damaging herself, so she is fully ballasted down. The 6000hp tug/supply vessel Pacific Chieftain, the biggest tug in New Zealand waters, is ordered from New Plymouth, where she is working for Shell Todd Oil Services. Her crew will be augmented, and she will take three days to arrive.
Friday, February 8. The master reports that the ship is showing signs of stress: two tanks have water in them. The MSA morning report fails to mention any oil leakage, but leakage is detected at 1220 hours, and 11 people leave their waterfront homes that night because of the smell of oil. (A later MSA summary states that a boom broke during the night of February 7, about one hour before high tide, allowing oil to creep up the Waimata and Taruheru Rivers. The boom is not immediately repaired because of safety issues.) Oil-spill equipment is arriving in Gisborne. Efforts at high tide (1430 hours) by the harbour tugs to manoeuvre alongside the Jody F are fruitless, as are attempts by the ship to free herself. (Somewhere about now, HMNZS Endeavour, a naval replenishment ship, is ordered to Gisborne to assist. She is in transit from Dunedin to Devonport after supporting the Prime Minister's visit to the Auckland Islands, far to the south of New Zealand's South Island.)
Sunday, February 10. The MSA report states that oil leakage has largely been eliminated. The beach cleanup starts, using a front-end loader and hand tools, while oil floating at sea is broken up by dispersants. An RNZAF Hercules has flown two large inflatable boats or so-called "barges" from Australia. They allow the start of oil removal from the ship. The thick fuel oil is heated by the ship's heaters until it flows freely and is then pumped into the "barges." (These large inflatables do not have tanks; the oil is pumped into the open volume surrounded by the flotation collar.) Transferring oil to the Endeavour's tanks at about 11 tonnes per hour is both slow and difficult, because the hot oil cools to the ambient seawater temperature during the barge's trip across the harbour. The weather is expected to deteriorate later in the week. Near-gale force winds are predicted, and there is talk of 1.8m to 4m swells. Monday, February 11. The Pacific Chieftain arrives from New Plymouth and puts a line on the bow of the Jody F Millennium to stabilise her. The tug will also deploy the beach gear. It is anticipated that the Pacific Chieftain's 98 tonnes of bollard pull might be enough to free the Jody F Millennium. She has to be pulled through or lifted over a 2m to 3m sandbar to get her off, the salvage-company spokesman reports, so a significant amount of cargo must be removed. He rates the job as an eight on a scale of 10. Oil removal continues. Wildlife is still largely unaffected, with only several dozen seabirds lightly oiled and two birds badly oiled. Wildlife experts have cleaned these. If the weather deteriorates as expected, the Endeavour will leave port. Tuesday, February 12. Oil removal is stopped during the night when the winds grow too strong. It is estimated that about half the oil has either escaped or been transferred (but the report does not state where it was transferred to.) The Endeavour leaves at about 0400 hours to escape the weather, and heads for Devonport in Auckland. She carries some oil, while road tankers take the remaining salvaged oil to Napier. Swells force the Jody F to shift position, and she now points 35 degrees sou'west. The new position will make refloating easier. Some reports state that two helicopters start removing logs, one at a time, to a local sawmill yard. The salvor estimates that some 4400 tonnes of logs, those carried on deck, will have to be removed before the ship can be freed. The tug Sea Tow 22 is expected to arrive today with a barge that will accept logs lifted off the ship. About five miles of shoreline are fouled. The two badly oiled seabirds have died. Wednesday, February 13. The MSA report is more a summary of what has happened from the start than a report for the day. The Sea Tow 22 arrives with the barge Sea Tow 17 but, according to the MSA report, "the helicopters start to remove logs at midday." Divers inspect the ship. They report that she has settled 4m deep into the bottom, with sand scoured away on the seaward side until a rocky bottom is revealed, while a trench has been scoured away on the land side. "She was attempting to float herself," an official news release later states. Water depths around the Jody F now range from 3m to nearly 5m. About 44 tonnes of oil have leaked out of the Jody F, but now seems to have stopped. A press report states that there is 772 tonnes of oil on board the Jody F. Salvors edge the bow of the ship 70 degrees to face the waves, and hope to use the swells from the expected bad weather to assist refloating. There will be a last-minute deballasting, and then the Sea Tow 22 (25 tonnes pull) and the Pacific Chieftain (95 tonnes pull) hope to pull the Jody F free and over the 3m sandbar. The swell should help by lifting the vessel. During the day the weather does deteriorate. By late afternoon the winds reach gale force, and seas are predicted to run 4m to 5.2m again, with occasional higher swells to 7m. The storm should last "through Friday." Government authorities now mention the possibility of the ship breaking up. Thursday, February 14. Last night the two tugs moved the Jody F a further 28 degrees towards the sea. Wind gusts are up to 35 knots and the seas are running 4m to 6m high. Plans are ready for evacuating the crew and seaside residents if the ship breaks up and releases the remaining oil. The crew is still staying on board. Early in the afternoon the two tugs take a strain again, but the Pacific Chieftain's 56mm steel-wire hawser apparently catches on something on the sea bottom and parts. The Sea Tow 22 is not strong enough to hold the ship's head up, and the Jody F resumes her position side-on to the heavy seas in about her original position. The lost stability provided by the strain taken by the Pacific Chieftain may lead to further oil pollution. A tug may be required to hold the Jody F's stern, since it tends to move along the beach, but there are two problems: the water may be too shallow for a tug, and there is a sewer outfall to consider. There are no signs of oil leakage. The latest estimate is that 470 tonnes of oil remain on board, with 219 tonnes in the bottom tanks. Friday, February 15. Procuring and installing a new towing wire starts on the Pacific Chieftain. This should take about two days. The tug enters port to pick up two large anchors and other parts of the ground tackle and, if the weather permits, she will lay it before the next attempt. The ship is still being pounded by 4m swells, and has moved about 60m west towards the sewer outfall. The bow is now 550m away, so there is no immediate threat to the pipeline. Some of the 219 tonnes of oil is being pumped to sturdier parts of the vessel. Helicopters will probably remove 1100 tonnes of logs. Two more cracks are found in the Jody F's ballast tanks, but are believed to be the result of the original stranding. Saturday, February 16. No MSA report is released. Government officials are apparently using the weekend to catch up on missed sleep. A marine biologist reports that the leaked oil is affecting junior crayfish, which use Gisborne Harbour as an important "settlement" in which to grow up. Otherwise, "routine" work probably continues. Sunday, February 17. The Keera arrives from Melbourne. She can provide 73 tonnes of pull. All three tugs are attached to the ship, and the ground tackle or beach gear (an arrangement of anchors, chains, wire and force-multiplying blocks) has been fastened to the ship's anchor windlass. The Pacific Chieftain and the ground tackle turn the ship so she is nearer facing the sea. Otherwise, no news. Monday. February 18. The MSA report announces that an attempt will be made on Wednesday to refloat the ship, although other reports state that the effort may happen about noon tomorrow. In any case, refloating will be during daylight hours only, and will be extremely slow because of rocks in the area. The Sea Tow 22 will move to the stern of the Jody F to control sideways movements. Nearly 396 tonnes of oil has been transferred to a safer position on the ship, and the remaining 33 to 55 tonnes in the double-bottom tanks has hardened and is difficult to remove. The latest estimate is that perhaps a thousand more logs may have to be taken off. There is speculation as to where the ship would be taken after being refloated, since no repair facility in New Zealand can take the Jody F because of her beam. Australia? Singapore? The weather is improving, and swells are down to 0.9m to 1.5m Tuesday, February 19. The weather is good today, and the waves in the harbour are inconsequential. The Sea Tow 22 is at the stern of the Jody F, while the other two tugs are attached to the bow. They shift the vessel's bow about 20 degrees seaward. The morning report states that if she wants to move, they will try refloating her. A total of 276 tonnes of logs have been taken off so far. Up to 2200 tonnes more may be offloaded directly onto the Sea Tow barge. Wednesday, February 20. The harbour's surface is mirror-like and logs are being offloaded into the Sea Tow barge. About 2200 tonnes have been transferred so far after all-night work, adding to the 250 tonnes previously offloaded by the helicopters. These reduce the Jody F's draft by 50cm. Deballasting starts at 0600 hours for another attempt to swing the ship, this time about 36 degrees. If all goes well, a refloating attempt will be made. Word is spreading that the vessel is named after the American actress Jody Foster, whom the owner reportedly likes very much. The locals are relaxed enough now so that jokes appear about similarities between the tug colour schemes and those of rugby teams: yellow and black for the Wellington "Hurricanes" and the Keera, and red and black for the Canterbury team and the Sea Tow tugs. Thursday, February 21. No salvage attempt today. The ship's bow is now up against a sandbar. A hydrographic survey later today will reveal its details. Logs continue to be offloaded into the Sea Tow barge, which is taken into port to be unloaded. The helicopters are also lifting off logs. Removing the deck logs is expected to reduce the ship's draft enough to allow her to be refloated. Another plus will be access to the manhole doors on top of the topside tanks. When some of these can be opened, the oil in their tanks can be pumped into tanks on the Sea Tow barge, while logs continue to be offloaded by the ship's derricks and the helicopters. The inflatable "barges" are put on the wharf for cleaning. The beaches are opened for access, but closed for swimming and seafood gathering. Friday, February 22. There will be no refloating attempt today, but last night the tugs managed to swing the Jody F's bow 10 degrees seaward and it is now heading 191 degrees. (The channel runs approximately 235 degrees.) The tops of the topside tanks are now accessible, so pumping from them is possible. The MSA report fails to mention whether log removal continues, and enigmatically states that "helicopters may also be used to remove logs." The Pacific Chieftain returns to New Plymouth to resume her duties for Shell Todd, and will be replaced by Sea Tow 25, a smaller tug with only 4000hp but with "a similar bollard pull," says the MSA. (Other sources credit the Sea Tow 25 with 73 tonnes of bollard pull, compared with the 95 tonnes of the Pacific Chieftain.) The next refloating attempt may come at high tide early tomorrow afternoon. Saturday, February 23. Refloating will take place at high tide - 1450 hours today! So promises the MSA's morning report. In fact, the refloating attempt moves the Jody F some 70m seaward. A hydrographic survey shows another 244m or 335m is needed. During the evening, three helicopters unload logs at the rate of 110 tonnes an hour. The Frequently Asked Questions feature on the MSA website provides facts and figures that reflect more-leisurely looks at what was really the situation, although even the FAQ are inconsistent with the daily MSA morning reports. For example, the FAQ states that an oil boom broke on the night of February 7, allowing oil to get up two rivers, yet the daily report had it that oil leakage was not detected until February 8. In another instance, according to the FAQ, "the oil on board at the time of stranding was actually 707 tonnes of intermediate fuel oil (IFO 380), a viscous oil that must be heated to be pumped easily. In addition, there were 69 tonnes of marine diesel fuel (MDO 180) for generators and about 21 tonnes of lubricating oil. As of February 20, 451 tonnes of the IFO remained on board (400 tonnes in tanks high in the ship), while 200 tonnes were retrieved and are aboard the Endeavour or at Napier, 29.5 tonnes of IFO were spilled and are in about 40 cubic yards of sand/oil mix scraped off the beach, and 600 to 800 litres have been collected from boom collection areas. The diesel oil is safe in tanks within the engine room. Sunday, February 24. The helicopters are back to work, while deballasting starts again at 0630 hours. At 1330 hours, the helicopters stop and the tugs Sea Tow 25 and Sea Tow 17, Keera, and the local tug Titirangi, along with the beach gear, pull, while smaller tugs push at the stern. (The MSA no doubt means the Sea Tow 22, since Sea Tow 17 is the barge.) The efforts start swinging the ship from side to side. (She is hung up amidships.) Bit by grudging bit, the ship moves forward. Suddenly, at about 1500 hours, the Keera's stretcher (a springy line inserted in the tow line to give some resiliency) parts, although it is rated for 165 tonnes. Unfazed, the salvage master moves the Keera to push on the stern, while the two local tugs, the Titirangi and Turihaua, push against the ship's sides. Just after 1600 hours, the Jody F suddenly floats free, while thousands cheer from the shore. The log carrier is towed some miles to sea and is held there by two tugs, while diver surveys and internal inspections take place. The rudder and its actuating gear are badly damaged. Cracks in the No. 3 double-bottom that allowed the oil leak are temporarily patched. A large (about 7.9m by 1.5m) hole in the No. 5 ballast tank has a dangling, bent-back plate, which acted like a brake in the sand. The bottom of the ship is rippled across the No.1 and 2 tanks, but this is of no structural concern. An anchor is supplied to replace the two anchors left buried in the Gisborne Harbour bottom. The Keera, escorted by Sea Tow 25, tows the Jody F Millennium to Tauranga for more repairs and log unloading. The final underwater repairs will be made in Singapore. It took 18 days to refloat the vessel. Good luck and favourable factors played a role. The ship grounded on a soft bottom and a port was nearby. Bad weather did not damage the ship further, and so neither the MSA nor the salvor had to overcome a worst-case scenario. The government's oil-spill response effort was rapid, well controlled and effective, and cost approximately $2 million. The salvage effort was equally effective. As predicted, it had been an eight out of a possible 10. Epilogue. On February 14, an article appeared in a New Zealand newspaper detailing "mistakes made" in the opinion of "one of New Zealand's most experienced master mariners." In summary, he believed that
perhaps the Jody F should have left earlier He questioned whether Gisborne has adequate moorings. He summarised by stating, "There is no physical way that (that) ship could have left port safely." The government's investigation reports may agree.
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This is just a selection of the articles in NZ
Professional Skipper |
Seven
Filipino seafarers flew home on July 16 without their
wages, after being stranded for months in Auckland
while the owners of their vessel, the Black Bart,
rowed over money. 
The
chronology is largely based on the daily reports by
the cognisant agency, the New Zealand Maritime Safety
Authority, but also incorporates other news reports
and additional information in order to provide a
somewhat clearer picture of what probably happened.
However, there is one major (and irritating) caveat:
facts and figures often differ in successive reports.
In short, what is detailed below is only an
approximation of what happened. 
The
sizeable coastal tug Sea Tow 22 is ordered from Picton,
while the large offshore tug Keera is ordered from
Melbourne. The salvor starts a search for large
anchors, which weigh between 5.5 and 11 tonnes, chain,
and other tackle for a so-called "beach gear" that may
help free the Jody F, and will help stabilise her
before the refloating. Two anchors are found in Picton,
a small port in the north of the South Island, while
33 tonnes of other gear is airfreighted from
Australia.
Saturday,
Feb 9. Oil is leaking from an underwater tank with a
198 tonne capacity, and has created a slick about 100m
long. Some oil reaches the shore. Helicopter spraying
of dispersants took place on the previous night. The
plan is to pump oil from the bottom fuel tanks to the
upper wing tanks above the water. The Endeavour
arrives. She will hold oil retrieved from the vessel's
tanks. The salvor has prepared a draft salvage plan
for the vessel owner's approval. Everyone is hoping
the weather stays fair.