hello there

[James blake]

As I have posted before, read the posts in `SEAFARING STORIES` THREAD. in the `SWINGING THE LEAD FORUM.`
There are many seafaring stories in there from those day or years you mention.
Cheers
Brian

cheers Brian, I'm still trying to navigate my way round the board

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Terry and James,I did 62 days nonstop in a 160,000 tonne dwt bulk/ore carrier with coal from Hay Point,Queensland to Ensted power station ,Denmark.Charterers speed was 10 knots.We rolled stiffly for 28 of those days ,(yes big ships can roll heavily),across the Southern Ocean to the Cape of Good Hope,where we were scheduled a helicopter mail drop.Due to poor weather that was aborted and we continued north to Europe.We didn't even see any land on the radar as we passed 60 miles south of the Cape.First land we sighted was off Ushant at the approaches to the Channel.Then an exhausting often nerve wracking finale ,with a 65 foot draught through the Channel.(Eyes glued to the radar.We had satnav and Decca navigator,but no electronic collision avoidance systems at that time.) and round the Skagerrak to Denmark.Then a payoff 3 days before Christmas.Whoopee! Sometimes we earned our money!Attachment 19877

would a ship that size sail back empty to Australia or would you have another cargo going back the way?

[Ivan Cloherty]

MAIL, could change a man's life, especially on trampers were mail from your loved one or family never arrived at the next port, with your loved one you would put a number on the envelope and posted it so that she would know that she had received all or some were missing. Mail missed the ship for a number of reasons, change of orders whilst at sea, the agent in the previous port did not consider it a priority to forward the mail , or he had had no instructions from the owners on where to forward it. A man may receive a letter in port 'B' his wife telling him she was pregnant, and receive no mail in ports 'C' 'D' 'E' as it had missed the ship by the time he received mail in port 'F' he may be sick with worry, remember there could be weeks at sea between each port. No good trying to phone, as had to book 24 -72 hours in advance to try and get a connection, by that time you may have sailed again. Lack of mail often made mountains out of mole hills, sending telegrams was nearly a months wages. It also worked the other way, in some ports you could not mail your letters (mainland China) which meant if you sailed from OZ and gave the pilot a letter to post, which they always did, the next opportunity would be about 3 months later, by this time your girl had run off with some shore wallah as she thought you didn't care about her. It took a special type of female to be a seaman's girl or wife. Some of us were very lucky and the girls waited, some guys were unlucky, but then again none of us were angels when away, but receiving a letter (or not receiving one) could influence your decisions when ashore in some foreign land surrounded by exotic women, although I have found in life (from observation!!) take them out of their natural surroundings and transport them to cold Northern climes they don't retain their exotic appearance, (am I allowed to say that?)

Mail was your lifeline and could make a sane man wild if not received. I often received mail six or more months after it had been mailed, but it never stopped me writing as I knew my girl was one of the special ones. Met her at a dance on Friday, my 'Nights aboard' (official duty) were Saturday and Sunday, saw her for lunch on Monday, sailed Monday evening, never saw her again for 22 months, saw her blossom only by photographs, we were married about a year after I came home, having had to return to sea in that period and we had 28 years of honeymoon before she died of cancer at a fairly young age, you always know when you are 'really in love'

[Captain Kong]

Mostly the only mail I ever got were `Dear Johns`. and they always went onto the Notice Board for all hands to have a good laugh at, this got you over it.
Some Married men who got Dear Johns off their wives have committed suicide over it
When I was married I very rarely got a letter off the wife. after seven months of no news from home is very frustrating. I then flew home from the Gulf to find an empty house, not a stick of furniture left. She had run off with another fellow,
Another friend of mine from the Isle of Man, didn't receive any mail from his parents. We paid off in London, off a Blue Star boat from Australia, five month trip. We got the train from Euston to Liverpool, drinking in the bar all the way. He just managed to catch the last boat to Douglas that night.
Arrives home, very late, and very drunk, The house is in darkness, so he let himself in, very quietly, crept upstairs and crashed onto his bed. Terrible screams from a girl who was in `his ` bed, A man ran in from another bedroom and battered him, the Police were called and he was thrown into the Nick for the night. It was then found that his parents had sold the house and another family had moved in. So he had never received the letter they had sent him. All was forgiven when it was sorted.
So having no mail can create lots of problems.
Brian

[Des Taff Jenkins]

#37.... Brian in the 50"s and probably the 60"s used to hear a lot about this East of Suez bonus. What was this for and why was it stopped. Certainly wasn't there on my 12 months on two different tankers which were both east of Suez joining and leaving. Cheers JS

Hi John.
I'm not sure about this but that East of Suez bonus might have been paid by the BTC, they had their own tugs up the gulf ports manned by their own officers and sometimes cadets, the deck crew Arabs, I remember a cadet being swapped from a tanker I was on to a tug and the cadet who came aboard was a little crazy after six months on one of their tugs.
Cheers Des

[Gulliver]

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would a ship that size sail back empty to Australia or would you have another cargo going back the way?

Well James, like most bulk carriers clever chartering by the owners usually ensured the most profitable means to operate ships,usually avoiding as much dead mileage as possible obviously.
My personal log which I kept for every vessel I sailed in shows the following 8 month trip.

1985:16^TH/17^TH April :Flew London to Tokyo,Japan
Joined 17^th April at CHIBA Japan- v/l was part discharging iron ore ex Brazil
Dep.CHIBA 18/4
MIZUSHIMA,Japan 20-23/4 part discharging remainder.
HAY POINT Australia In Ballast (empty) arr 7/5.loaded 159 tonnes coal for British Steel,Redcar,Teesside
Dep.HAY POINT 14/5
Arr.REDCAR,Teesside 9/7 Discharged
Dep.REDCAR 16/7 in Ballast
Anchored 9-19/8 TUBARAO,Brazil
Dep.TUBARAO 20/8 loaded 158,000 tonnes Iron Ore
[At that time it was the fastest iron ore loading port in the world]
Arr.POHANG,S.Korea 4/10 via C.Good Hope& Sunda Strait .Discharged.
{Intermediate passing points abeam were C.Good Hope (well south of at 165miles due to Great Circle sailing 2/9, then by contrast 6 nm (!) South Krakatoa(Sunda Strait) 22/9,
Dep.POHANG S.Korea 11/10 In Ballast
Arr.HAY POINT,Australia 22/10 Loaded 160,000 tonnes coal
Dep.HAY POINT 26/10
Arr.ENSTED Power Station,Denmark 23/12. For discharging.Vessel was then scheduled for another Brazil-Far East charter after discharging.
Flew Home :Skrydstrup-Manchester via Copenhagen and Amsterdam.

TOTAL Ship Mileage 53,401 nm.
Days Aboard 251
At Sea 205 days ( 81.7% )In Port 33days (13.1%) At Anchor 13 days(5.2%)

[Gulliver]

My Error Correction for above post:

HAY POINT (Line 7) should read 159,000 tonnes,not 159 !! Coffee & News.gif Delete.gif

[j.sabourn]

#56. Chiba caught my eye Gulliver, joined a ship there already mentioned the Maratha Envoy after flying out from London, via skipol and over the pole with Jal airlines and joined in 28.2.69. Always remember Chiba as were loading steel products and the first thing on getting on board the head stevedore came up to me and asked how far I wanted to go over the plimsolls. The mate I was relieving stood back saying nothing so don't know where he stood in the matter. However the stevedore was disappointed with my reply saying the previous Greek ship had gone 4 inches over. I have not kept a record as you have and have to go on discharge book as tried to keep a record for my own needs. Can not really remember any ocean passages in ballast though, although we did go from South Korea to Japan one time when the old man skinned out in South Korea, picked up another in Japan. After a few trips up the Lakes from japan and back to same place with grain. Finally paid off in Durban 21.3.70. which would have been 1 year and 22 days would have been slightly longer as had a couple of days whooping it up in Durban, and even longer if hadn't got entangled with this Liverpool mercenary from the Congo. As could see trouble brewing from the locals. I worked for a short time when my leave ran out in Runcimans office for a couple of weeks in 1959. Up until that that time since the war, if a 10,000 ton tramp got 2 cargoes a year they were making good money, in latter years according to the figures I saw in the old pen and ink ledgers they must have been making a fortune. The biggest write off for the tax man was depreciation on the hull and machinery. My heart does not bleed for the poor and misunderstood shipowner. Cheers JS

[j.sabourn]

#57... My words sometimes give the wrong impression when I refer to cant remember being in ballast I refer only to the Maratha Envoy. Being in Ballast on passage was very common on the old 10,000 tramp ship. Usually after Japan it was quite common to go Japan to Australia in ballast, where all hands and the cook used to prepare the ship fitting out with shifting boards and feeders for grain, a big job on a conventional ship. If the unions in Oz at the time got complaints that fitting out had been done by ship they would black the ship, pull down and have shore carpenters refit, the same applied coming out of the Lakes and topping off in Montreal Three Rivers or Quebec. My first trip to sea was in Ballast from Belfast to Cuba for sugar for Japan down to FNQ for sugar for Europe so in 6 months only had 2 cargos, but was already well into providing profits. Being in ballast was very common in the trampship trade. JS

[j.sabourn]

Another one often used to amplify profits , but mainly to circumvent any challenges to costs to a company, was to have every ship registered as a separate company. One would only be aware of this if handling the Certificate of Registry. Would make any legal representation for damages against a ship applicable to that ship alone, or so they hoped. Don't think the Liner Companies resorted to this as wouldn't know as never saw their Cert. Of Registrations JS.

[John Arton]

The Baltic Dry Cargo shipping index is the bench mark for charters relating to iron ore, grain etc. and recently due to over supply in the shipping industry along with the drop in cargoes destined for China mainly, has recently dropped below the 400 mark. This, I assume, means that owners are receiving less than $4000 per day for their vessels. Break even when I was sailing on bulkers in C.P. in the 70's/80's was around £5000 per day (fuel costs not included).
On a number of voyage charters I have seen ballast clauses where the owner received a fixed sum for the ballast passage but this most likely applied when there was a shortage of vessels available for the cargoes. Often saw that on voyage charters for grain from the USA and S. America to Europe and/or Russia.
rgds
JA