captain phillips the film

[Keith Tindell]

In the film Captain Phillips he is taken by the Somalis in the lifeboat and the life boat launched, the lifeboat is the free fall type. I have no knowledge of these lifeboats, they came long after i had finished . In the film they had no harnesses fitted in the seats, which i would have thought would have caused injury, like hitting concrete from 60-80 ft. was this poetic licence for the film? or are there restraints fitted under real conditions.. Some of you guys will know i am sure, regards KT

[robpage]

http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/othpd...399/oth391.pdf

[John Arton]

Keith, Rob
Sailed with free fall on a number of ships. Although you may think that getting everyone quickly into the boat and seated correctly, especially in an emergency, from the drills I conducted and took part in, we could load the boat and release it safely in about the same time as it takes to load and release a conventional enclosed life boat but with the added bonus in the free fall of not having to worry about the on load release gear malfunctioning or releasing to early whilst the boat was still suspended above water.
The only problem I encountered was on the first ever launch we did where we did not load the boat equally port and stbd and on entering the water the boat took a big sheer off to the more weighted side and nearly rammed to dolphin. The impact on hitting the water was a lot less than the jolting movements you get on fairground rides and even if you were not tightly strapped in with the head restraint fixed there was not too much movement. Having said that we were not free falling from the 60 metres or anything like that, so I guess that when falling from such heights it is vital that you are correctly strapped in, As opposed to a conventional davit launched enclosed lifeboat where there are no restraints fitted so is it goes tits up on launching then all the occupants will be flying around loose.
Give me a free fall any day, even if I was not tightly strapped in, I would rather take my chances with that than be sitting in a conventional enclosed lifeboat worrying if the onload arrangement had been correctly set.
rgds
JA

[j.sabourn]

And that somebody had put the plug in. John Sabourn

[j.sabourn]

Having just got back from an area in Western Australia where Brian has done some of his romancing some of the beauties of the Region, must report my limitations were very restricted Brian. As was in the company of non seamen and not wanting to give them the wrong idea about our very strong and high morals we all have, did not want to give them the impression of being all sexual deviates, so kept a low profile, as also had the wife on board. However as this post was about the film Capt. Phillips, I must confess to have had seen about 75 per cent of it. As most of you probably know long train journeys out here usually have personal screens fitted in the back of the seating the same as on most aircraft. Among many others was this film, I watched it for about 40 minutes of the 7 hour train journey going before switching to more interesting material, coming back I also watched it for brief intervals of about 15 minutes each. I found I was getting annoyed at these little skinny ribbed Somalis taken these big overfed yanks by the balls and telling them what to do. I know he who holds the gun has control, but could only compare what would have happened with the usual 40 odd crew we had in our times. I think they would have finished up as shark bait. Seeing that how also a ship of that size was manned brought vividly to mind of how present day shipping is manned. I dont know if anyone has any records of Russian or chinese ships being attacked by the same method, but by the number of crew on board same they must have second thoughts about doing so. The only part of the film I found true to form was the old hand of 25 years experience of shipping and being a union member and claiming he didnt sign up to fight pirates. If I was on that program on TV about awarding new releases stars, I would give it 2 out of five. I never managed to see the end of it as was arriving back in Perth after having 14 hours of available watching time. Cheers John S.

[robpage]

I found it incredulous that swapping the pirate leader for Captain Phillips , that Captain Phillips got into the lifeboat and instructed them how to use it , me I would have instructed them from the outside , like hey lasd hold the belts on the seats firmly around your necks tjen launch

[Ivan Cloherty]

Speaking from experience, it is surprising what you will do with a gun stuck in your face. Doesn't matter whether you can read or write or what size you are, if your finger is on the trigger you're in control. Respectfully what you would do if you've never been in that situation is in your imagination, again bullets don't care what size you are.

[robpage]

I don't know how much the film relates to reality , but there is a good number of the crew suing Captain Phillips/ Maersk in a class action in the US , te crucial point seems to be that Captain Phillips placed the crew unnecessarily in danger , now whether that is a ambulance chasing lawyer or sincere distress caused by an event , I have not got a clue details here http://www.idaratmaritime.com/wordpress/?p=404

[j.sabourn]

I got the impression there were 4 maybe 5 firearm toting pirates. My point was that it would of been nigh on impossible for such a small number of men to hold 45 of a crew in detention unless they had them all together in one enclosed place. I have myself also been under the barrel of a gun but had the sense not to go face to face with it and turned my back on it and told the few crew we had to go back inside and close the steel doors. This was a relavely small ship with only a total crew of 9 on board. At a rough guess there were a dozen intruders, armed with at least one shotgun. They weren trying to steel the ship only all the stores under the focsle. I considered the owners well able to afford. JS

[robpage]

the crew totals 21 for this ship , and they were in a Zone that had been highlighted as an area to stay clear of