For all the landlubbers who think that ships are polluting the oceans, well I’m afraid that in some cases they are right, unfortunately.
I just read about another case of the “magic pipe” being discovered on a ship by the US Coastguard in Tampa, Florida. A magic pipe is a home made pipe used to bypass the oily water separator and to pump the oily water over the side into the ocean. Some ship operators seem to think that it is cheaper to pollute the ocean than to use the equipment fitted onboard to separate the oily water, and in this case the company had ordered their engineers to routinely dump oily water over the side.
Every ship has a log of all oil filling and transfer, even oily water, but these logs had been deliberately falsified so the illegal oil dumping could take place.
So how did they get caught? They had covered up their tracks, faked the records, and removed the magic pipe before arriving in Tampa.
Someone onboard blew the whistle, and tipped off the authorities, so the USCG came onboard and found what they needed to hold the ship and make arrests. Two Filipino citizens now face up to 6 years in prison and fines of $250,000. They carried out the act so they carry the can, but they were ordered to carry out the deed by their company in Japan, or probably lose their job, so lose job or go to jail….magic! They have 6 years to think about what they did.
And the whistle blower? He gets a hefty reward, probably more than he’d earn in a year. Maybe he might think about his shipmates in jail?
And the company, hardly a cheap alternative…not so magic really.
And the magic pipes? They will magically appear again on some other ship, carrying flat screen TV’s or cars or oil or whatever…….
Vehicle carrier “Courage”
Registered in Wilmington Delaware USA
The American flagged Vehicle Carrier Courage of American Roll-On Roll-Off Carrier (ARC) seen yesterday leaving Southampton on a voyage to destination undisclosed, she was heading west in the English channel on the AIS at her last contact. A fairly rare occurrence to see the Stars & stripes flying on the mast these days in this neck of the woods, I even thought it was a Liberian until it passed a bit closer. The ship was once a Wallenius called “Aida” and the name has only been painted over. According to local information sources vehicles carried are often military vehicles and that is why it’s American. The website looks however normal enough http://www.arrcnet.com/.
I like France and the French, even though I occasionally take a poke at them, ( VHF post )it’s all meant in the best possible taste as Kenny Everett used to say. I was doing a bit of surfing and I found the following French Article on the BBC’s web page.
Looks like the relationship between France and the USA has been rocky once or twice!
How is with the “Freedom Fries” now? I always thought that was such an irony with France’s everlasting gift to The US being called “Liberty”, perhaps the relationship is getting better again these days.
I noticed that my Technorati was showing an incoming link to Sea Fever, so curiosity got the better of me and I went for a visit. I was delighted to find another maritime blog and you would do no harm clicking in to seafever.org if you are into maritime heritage, and the like. Sailing ships seem to figure probably because the author was in the American Sail Training Association a recent post was very interesting about Alan Villiers check it out Sea Fever
One of my old ships was on a regular run to LOOP or Louisiana Offshore Oil Port we transported crude oil from West Africa and the Persian Gulf to LOOP by VLCC and then the oil was then piped on to the mainland US for refining. This was my first experience of the US Coast Guard and US Pilotage, it was before 9-11 so the atmosphere of security was controlled but not as tough as it is for sailors visiting the US today. But back then you could still get ashore if you wanted to. We arranged for the agent to buy us Levi’s and other American goods, not that we were living in the Soviet Union or anything but because they were so cheap.
Anyway one of the Able Seaman was one Jesus Rey Fernandez from Cebu in the Phillipines, Jesus (which was pronounced Hay-soos by the Filipino sailors and Jees-us by the officers probably because of the novelty and Jay-zuz by me because I couldn’t resist) was an old sea dog with a woman and child in every port the ship managed to get to, he looked about 90 but was probably more in the region of 60, he nearly starved to death one trip when he managed to spit out his false teeth into the Suez Canal, he was only gobbing over the side but the teeth went sailing in with whatever he was spitting out, he stood at the rail for ages his mouth half open and shiny gums silently gnashing in disbelief, the cook didn’t like him as it was and he had to suck down all his food until a reserve set of teeth arrived.
We were sailing from LOOP and we got instructions to take bunkers (thats fuel for the land lubbers) at Pilot Town on the Mississippi, so we headed for the entrance and took on board our river pilot for the short passage up to Pilot Town. He arrived on the bridge out of breath and proceeded to light up a Marlboro before getting down to the usual introductions and how are you Captain and would you like a cup of coffee Pilot, after the first blast of Nicotine he calmed down ordered half ahead on the engine and a man on the wheel. The currents at the mouth of the Mississippi River are strong and can be unpredictable so a good helmsman is required, the old man wasn’t so old and probably put the wrong man on the wheel, so the ships head was a bit shaky approaching the entrance, the pilot got angry and shouted with a strong southern accent “Jesus Christ Cap’n, this is no time to put a beginner on the wheel” just then Able Seaman Jesus Rey appeared like an apparition on the bridge, the Captain said “Jesus, take the wheel!” The pilot raised an eyebrow, but said nothing, he was satisfied as long as the steering went well. We negotiated our way up to the designated spot which is little more than a bend in the river and anchored 4 shackles on the starboard and 1 on the port. The pilot made his way off after doing a professional job even if he was a bit rough around the edges himself.
Later on in the bar, the old man was giving his version of the story while sucking down our newly bought Coors beer, it was a little bit more exaggerated than reality, the pilot smoked more cigarettes, and spoke with a John Wayne accent and said “Truly this man was the son of God” when Jesus took the wheel,………not really as it happened but hardly the first time a story about Jesus got exaggerated……
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