Ready to take the wheel?

[j.sabourn]

Ivan she got what looks like a red Ball hanging up forward. Does this mean shes at anchor. That Red ball is also a norwegian fender. Cheers JS

[cappy]

sniffer dog to busy sniffing the mess left by all the dog owners who think shields beach is a dog bog

[j.sabourn]

Cappy is that why the beach is nearly deserted. Everyone waiting for the spring tides. Thought Shields Beach had won the best beach in Britain one year not too far back. Anyhow the magistrates in W.Bay must have forgotten about me as was not arrested last june for non payment of poll tax. If was would claim there was too much dog poo on beach and is why I wouldn't pay. Think of the electric Bill with all those decorations you have up, hope you have small wattage lamps in. Cheers John S.

[cappy]

I think this bugger was beach fishing ivan

[robpage]

Iok2ru

[Louis the Amigo]

Hi Shipmates, All ships in my time had wheels except the big ones tankers and the like, but going round the British coast in winter in force 8 gales on an old fashion coal boat with proper full size wheel, and chain steering is something you never forget and the magnetic compass doing a jig ,and the dim light to steer her by ?they dont teach you that on any paper , no iron mike on that one... just you the helmsman against the stormy sea.

[happy daze john in oz]

How do they get a steering ticket on the modern ships, many of which have nothing more than a very small joystick to steer with, added to which is a computerised bridge?

[William Gardner]

rembber the sky hook

[leratty]

Cappy, p22, re tillers on yachts rather than wheels. Must say a tiller can be very very hard. one of our yachts a 50' Fife had a tiller & you required muscles in you s... to handle her in a following sea or a real breeze, much prefer a wheel. Aye WilliamG sure do mate (:

[John Arton]

My first trip was on a 60,000 ton tanker and the Captain insisted that I learnt to steer. Once I had the required number of hours and could understand all the helm orders I was issued with a steering ticket signed by the Master. There was a set of rules laid out by the B.O.T that you had to comply with before the ships master could consider you competent to steer and issue you with the steering ticket. This was in the 60's.
Once I had gained enough experience it then became my task as cadet to do all the steering when we were under pilotage so I had a number of long stands as it was go on and stop on from before picking up the pilot to final berthing and no relief, even for meals or smoko.
I ad joined in Tranmere and we were on the Persian Gulf run back and forth to Europe.
After about 6 months we were due to discharge in Tranmere again so I was steering from well before the Bar until we berthed at Tranmere. All was going well until we came around Crosby (If I recall correctly). Up to this point I had been steering by compass course given by the pilot. We came round the bend and I steaded her up on the course given to me by the pilot. By this time buildings ashore were prominent so once steady on the new course I lined up a building ashore with the foremast and proceeded to use that to keep her steady on course. With the current setting us across the channel keeping the ships head lined up on the building I had chosen when first steadying her up on the course given by the pilot, meant that the compass heading was altering as I compensated for any drift. After a short while the pilot started barking at me as the compass heading was different from the one he had ordered. I politely told him I was steering on a land mark but he would have nothing to do with that and so I brought her back onto the compass heading he wanted. Result, one embarrassed pilot suddenly realised that buoys that should have been passing down our stbd. side were now going to pass down our port side. At this point the Captain intervened and we got her back pointing at my land mark and into mid channel..
That trip's berthing was quite an experience even after the fracas in the approach.
We were one of the first ship's onto Tranmere South? after the North jetty had been demolished some time previously by a tanker berthing that had gone terribly wrong. (Could have been the other way round us berthing on the North jetty with the South jetty being demolished). As we approached we moved over to the Liverpool side of the channel, gave her hard a starboard and a good kick ahead to swing her round to starboard in order to berth stbd side too. Tugs were coming to assist but had not made fast yet. Once we were at right angles to the berth and across mid channel, full astern to use transverse thrust to stop ahead movement and continue the stbd swing. Problem was that the transverse thrust did not overcome the current effect sufficiently so we ended up going backwards at quite a pace towards the Liverpool side of the river. Stop engines was ordered and rung (bridge control) only to find that the engine order failed and we were still going full astern on the engines. Frantic phone call by the 2nd mate to the chief engineer in the engine room saying " chief the engine won't stop", reply from the chief "well what do you want me to do", " stop the bloody thing" being the bridge's reply. eventually got the bridge control disconnected and onto control room control and the engine stopped. By this time extra tugs had been called for and what should have been a normal berthing manoeuvre was turning into a nightmare. Whilst getting tugs made fast as we were berthing on a flood tide, we had drifted upstream past the jetties so it was full ahead and hard a starboard to try and get her around. She shot forward but was rather slow in her swing to such an extent that we were rapidly approaching our berth at an angle of almost 90 deg to it. We got that close before the swing, coupled with frantic aster movements and pulling by and pushing by the tugs eventually got her around enough so prevent us crashing into the jetty. The forward mooring gang had vacated the focsle as they thought that we were going to hit as had the shore mooring gang who were half way up the walkway by this time. Very brown trouser stuff but we eventually got her tied up with the pilot muttering all sorts of dark words about helmsmen, engineers etc. As it turned out when we reviewed it all, apart from the engine failure, most of the problems had been down to pilot error, starting the turn too soon, not boarding at the correct time so as to arrive off Tranmere at slack water etc.
Finally I am going to annoy some of our members here.
In all the years I spent at sea both as deck officer and in command, in the U.K. some of the most arrogant pilots I encountered were in Liverpool and Southampton a small minority of whom who never admit to their shortcomings.
rgds
JA