Why ships crash

[j.sabourn]

#20 A good example for starters to get the juices flowing would be to explain the difference between general average and particular average. JS.

[Ivan Cloherty]

Too late at night for that John, but both books are available on Amazon if any one is interested, my copies keep the door open on a windy day and have sentimental value, or is that mental value, as in torture!

[j.sabourn]

The only book as said once before I’ve kept is Nories tables , mainly for the conversion tables in them metric to imperial and such like. Often wonder what the modern navigator does with the marks on the hand lead line. Does he convert 3 5 7 and 10 fathom marks to metres to match up with today’s depths on charts in metric. Think the easiest way would be to just measure along the lead line with a metric tape measure ? JS

[Des Taff Jenkins]

It's a lifetime since I travelled through the Suez, it must have changed a hell of a lot after the Suez conflict, as I only remember British or French Pilots. I can imagine George Roby's son or grandson as a pilot, he would have one eye out for the Canal and one for anything loose on the ship,
was probably organising some big cranes for those containers if any had hit the shores.
Des

[j.sabourn]

In the early days after the Brits Frogs and Israelis tried to regain control the pilots were nearly all Russian. Then slowly over the years their own nationals seemed to fill the jobs. JS

[happy daze john in oz]

But it can happen any where.
Coming into Las Palmas on the Windsor, clear blue sky, no wind, no obstructions and yet the ship hit the quay.
Helmsman said he followed all instructions from pilot and it was not his fault.

[j.sabourn]

#10 The Admiral probably got all his info. On merchant ships by looking at sites like this. Probably found out about the Panama Canal being the one mainly recognised where the pilot was officially recognised as being in charge of the ship. Signed sealed and delivered . Haven’t seen the bye laws for the Panama for years , no doubt they will be changed by now as don’t believe the Canal Zone is under US naval control ? ? JS

[John Onslow]

Come on guys, ships don't 'crash' - cars, computers and aeroplanes do. Ships collide, run aground or get stranded,

[j.sabourn]

Know what you mean John. Today’s terminology leaves a lot to be desired . Don’t know if you ever worked offshore or not but when I did often thought some of these highly paid executives judging by the instructions they expected you to carry out, really thought you were driving a motor car. Sometimes the terminology can be very grating on the nerve ends. You missed out the Wall Street one in your list. Cheers JS ....

[Adrian Featherstonhaugh]

The old fixed screw steamship once away FAOP no one wanted to see that broken until EOP. To use the engines was sacrilege , and in any case the engineers wanted half an hours notice. JS

Dear Mr. Sabourn, the reason the engineers wanted "at least half an hours notice" is because to reduce engine RPM to a manoeuvring speed from FAOP revs in a shorter time period would have probably caused serious, possibly terminal, damage to any large, slow-speed engine. For context, when sailing as 4th Engineer on a mid-sized break-bulk ship on a voyage across the N.Atlantic, the bridge called the engine room to say that due to approaching fog, ship's speed had to be reduced to half-ahead in 10 minutes. Bear in mind that company instructions were that 'normally', reduction in engine RPM from FAOP to Full Ahead Manoeuvring would take 2-1/2 hours. I reduced the engine RPM much quicker than normal and the Ch/Eng requested additional time but, after 30 minutes, the bridge rang for Half Ahead. This was done immediately and the engine suffered a large crack in a cylinder head (between the fuel injector pocket and an exhaust valve seat). Fortunately the engine was still able to run but obviously there was a costly repair to be carried ouit once in port. On another occasion, one of our vessels with a large MAN main engine suffered cracks to all 9 cylinder heads when the bridge called for reduced RPM from FAOP speed. This was again due to encountering fog on passage. This led to the vessel being no longer under command and tugs had to be called. Not a good outcome.
As an engineer I failed to comprehend why, with the vessel in mid-Atlantic and not in close proximity to any other vessel, the bridge did not simply carry out figure-of-eight course changes over a period of a couple of hours to permit enough time for the engine RPM to be slowed enough to permit safe manoeuvring. Baffling.