Ballast

[John Cassels]

Anyone remember taking advantage of inclement weather to :swill wash " DB tanks ?.

[John Arton]

John
I was mate on a terrible obo that the Norwegian previous owners had used every available space to load crude oil into, including the topside wing ballast tanks. Took it over in drydock in Japan and to clean those topside tanks we were given barrels of seaclean chemical to pour in, then half fill with sea water and to let it slosh around for a couple of days whilst we were on our way to port hedland to load iron ore and then pump it out before arrival, direct to sea. Questioned about why we were breaking MARPOL as no oil discharge monitor fitted in ballast line discharge system but told to just get on with it.
Later, working for another outfit, they gave us some silicone liquid to add to ballast tanks and then part fill them, allow it to slosh around for a while and then pump it out. Worked a treat.
As mate on cape sized bulkers, always used to change ballast tank water during the ballast voyage as discharging in the likes of Rotterdam, le Havre and even Antwerp, had to take on ballast early on in the discharge to stay under the gantry cranes so we were sitting close to the harbour bottom and muddy and silty water would be taken into the ballast tanks.
Despite changing ballast there was still a fair amount of mud build up which meant we had to go in and hose it out during the loaded passage.
Rgds
J.A

[John Cassels]

Thanks yours John . I was also mate on a terrible OBO but that nightmare is for another day.
Must say that I just got into the habit of swill washing to stir up the mud even when we had taken clean ballast , anything just to try keep those
tanks mud free.

[Des Jenkins]

Hi John
When I think now about how we used to pump just about everything over the side on tankers, and I was only on about twelve, I shudder to think of what sort of prison term one would get today, But it's not only seamen who are doing it today, last night on TV they where showing Mutton Birds on Great Barrier Island with their stomachs full of plastic, they laid one down and squeezed its stomach and you could hear the crackling inside.
Des
Australia only processes a third of it's plastics, the rest goes into landfill

[Mike Hutchins]

Lots of spent caustic would've gone over the side through the years too....wonder what happens to it nowadays?
Mike.

[happy daze john in oz]

Des, I think some still goes over the side.
Evry now and then we see the remains of what may have been a tank wash.
Between here and NZ regularly see the signs of the oily surface.

[Graham Shaw]

Not so long ago a forensic lab conducted autopsies on coastal seagulls.They found levels of cholesterol equivalent to some humans in the majority of those gulls,many of which were overweight when compared to their species norms .They concluded that it was probably the well-known behaviour of gulls to forage at inland landfills,and most of all scavenging human food like fish and chips,donuts and other discarded or 'dive-bombed' food in coastal resort towns.
Once upon a time their seagull ancestors had a healthy diet of fish and other seafood.
Yes,I know it is more difficult than it used to be for them to get a healthier sustenance from the sea ,but I say really,humankind have contributed to their 'adopted' lifestyle by making it too easy for them...

[j.sabourn]

Will have to ask Des , Graham if hopefully he is feeding his magpies and other species of Australian birds , worms and other species of their natural food source and not the fried bread from the breakfast table.Just joking of course as know his wife won’t let him have fried bread, .Good to see you back , how was the South of France and hope it,was a good holiday ? Cheers JS

[Tony Taylor]

Not so long ago a forensic lab conducted autopsies on coastal seagulls.They found levels of cholesterol equivalent to some humans in the majority of those gulls,many of which were overweight when compared to their species norms .They concluded that it was probably the well-known behaviour of gulls to forage at inland landfills,and most of all scavenging human food like fish and chips,donuts and other discarded or 'dive-bombed' food in coastal resort towns.
Once upon a time their seagull ancestors had a healthy diet of fish and other seafood.
Yes,I know it is more difficult than it used to be for them to get a healthier sustenance from the sea ,but I say really,humankind have contributed to their 'adopted' lifestyle by making it too easy for them...

Graham, they have been conditioned to investigate black bin liners as a potential source of food. One of the local farmers round here diversified into growing trees and had two large fields neatly cultivated into long rows with blak polythene covering the ground around the seedlings to keep the weeds at bay. His first year saw his efforts decimated by seagulls ripping up the black poly. The following year he did away with black and used green I think, end of the problem.
ps just up the coast from you I heard the seagulls glow in the dark?

[James Curry]

Recently here in the road I live in we had several Herring Gulls being a bloody nusisance. They dive bomb cats ( Neighbour puts the cats food outside and the Gulls eat most of it). A lad across the road sorted the problem out over a week or two. Like us all he was bloody well fed up with the racket and the mess they make , cars covered in their muck. The neighbour now feeds the cat indoors after a heated discussion with a neighbour at the rear.
All I am saying is that was a nice air rifle that lad had. For now no more Herring Gulls.

All this crap about Gulls being a protected spiecies, nothing wrong with a bit of a cull now and then. They are SEA GULLS. I live about 2 miles from the sea.