What gets your goat!

[Ivan Cloherty]

Another nugget from our expert in post 1

'a single deck would not provide the longitudinal strength so an intermediate deck was added (tweendeck, my italics) . This was not a disadvantage with some cargoes, especially the grain and timber trades because part could be stowed in the intermediate deck'

Thereby speaks a man who has never constructed shifting boards and feeders in a tweendecker, and probably has no idea what they are, nor it seems has he tried to get bundles of timber into a tweendeck when the only available forklift was too big twixt deck and deckhead.

There are other nuggets where-in he states that Marine Supts (D & E) had no input into a ship's design as this is left to the shipbuilder, this is contrary to my own experience as a supt as we discussed various aspects before the design was signed off to the shipyard. He has made an awful lot of assumptions and it is a pity that this tome will be used as a reference tool by future generations

[Les Woodard]

Lets face it we live in a time where the truth has to take second place to power and money. Think this era will go down in history as the most untruthful era ever and second only to the good book as far as I am concerned. How many bloody wars lately have been fired up with alternate truths even when the population protests in millions they still think that they have the right to commit to a war. I do think that one of the problems is? Communications have become so readily available that as soon as a story starts there are numorous opposing views exspoused that it distorts the truth hence news becomes untrustworthy and the only way to get it across is to embelish it more than the previous media outlet. Can understand your frustration JS having to watch what happened being distorted to some one who has one eye on the story and the other on their bank account.

[j.sabourn]

Ivan when Seaforth maritime was having offshore vessels built abroad in Korea, the superintendants asked the masters and Chief Engineers for any input they may have had before they went to the yards they were being built. I cant speak for the engineers, but as regards bridge layouts there was a helluva lot of input when you had two consuls in the wheelhouse , one forward and one aft, and had to go from one to the other in a couple of seconds max. These consuls went the full beam of the wheelhouse and all the controls of the ship. Apart from manouvering you had all the cargo tanks, these consuls looked like something out of your favourite passenger jet, and all had to be within hands reach whilst driving the ship itself, also communications to different parts of vessel. Was not a job for any shipbuilder siting such without knowledge of the workings of the vessel. The chief would also have his similar suggestions. Is like building a house out here in Oz the owner tells the builder what he wants and not the other way round. Sounds like your favourite expert in shipping is a right dill, and someone should tell him the facts of life. Cheers JS My input as the first one would have been for a permanent chair behind each control unit as standing for anything over 18 hours is probably the cause of my present day leg cramps. Cheers JS

[Colin Wood]

Haven't heard of running from side to side to roll ship off of a rock or bank but there are written records of vessels where the crew were able to get over the chains in Constantinople harbour by sailing straight at the chains securing the entrance. The crew were all herded aft and when vessel touched the chains, all the crew ran forward and got away. Unfortunately the second boat trying it broke in two and sank.

[j.sabourn]

I wonder if any of these small sidewinders in the North Sea if anyone went into the stability criteria of having 250 survivors on board some were certificated up to 300 persons, not that one is worried too much in numbers as hardly going to say to the 300th person that's it bus full buzz buzz and away you go pick you up next time round. Never saw such stability statements on the LSA cert were the number of chairs, number of hot water bottles, ( didn't say where the Fresh Water was coming from to fill them ) Blankets and towels, packets of soup, All to the same number as the certificate. Think if everyone went to one side there would be a decidedly list. You could practically pull these vessels along the quay by hand. In a lot of cases had to do so as had no functional windlass as such and in at least one I was on their was no way of dropping an anchor, so going on a lee shore was always at the back of your mind. There again a trawler is built to carry fish in a hold, maybe they thought by pushing half drowned men down there would match the stability criteria, Cheers JS

[Alan Sharp]

John,
Have you tried quinine? I found that a couple of mouthfuls of tonic water with quinine keeps me free of leg cramps during the night.
(Doctors advice).
Regards, Alan