NZMPA article March 2018

NZMPA Pilot 

March 2018

I was a bit weary in the small hours of the other morning as we headed out to the awaiting 4-metre post-Gita swell and my next inward job, having had only just over 4 hours rest from the last job. I thought I might have a little whinge (you can’t take the Pom out of the boy…) about it to anyone interested in listening, until I realised that the other occupants of the pilot launch only had half as much sleep in the bank as me. Which is odd since everyone on board was working a 1:1 work ratio, so one would tend to assume that fatigue wouldn’t be an issue, but it evidently sometimes can be.

Port Otago Ltd company policy regarding servicing marine customers is, like most or all non-tidal constrained ports in New Zealand, to provide a 24/7/365 service and that is what both management and marine department workers have come to expect. Also, most workers realise that a 1:1 work ratio, albeit 24 hour on-call, is not at face value all that onerous, but in the case mentioned, had he known the circumstances, the master of the inbound vessel that my colleague was about to pilot would likely have had have serious reservations as to his pilot’s ability to do the job safely. It probably would not have complied with many shipping company Hours of Rest Regulations. Port Otago has a self-regulating but rather ad hoc system for fatigue management and company management probably assumes that it works well since no ships are delayed and apart from the odd gripe, everyone gets on with the job. Other than having a whinge, which on the morning in question, was to be my preferred method, the way to indicate fatigue via this system is to decline to do a job when one deems oneself too fatigued; the worker should walk away from the job and a replacement should be found. This is also in-keeping with company Health and Safety policy whereby, “no job is too important that it can’t be done safely”. Nice idea, but in practice it involves the admission that one cannot cope and a background fear of sanction for delaying shipping. These fears and ideas are less rational in today’s “less blame” culture, but still exist and have not been completely expunged from the workers psyche. Moreover, there’s that early hours decision-making process, and we’re all subject to the normal human behavioural practices; declining a job, especially in the wee small hours involves calling out an off-duty colleague often at short notice, and even that is based on the assumption that they are available as there is no specific call-out roster. Failing that, it’s a case of delaying a shipping movement or two, and whereas this would instantly focus management minds on the issue, it’s not done because it is anathema to our embedded culture which, despite the exhortations of BRM, thankfully in my opinion, remains that which embraces the “can do” attitude. There’s much merit in the “can do” approach but it does need managing. 

It could be argued that management abrogate responsibility by having workers self-manage their fatigue, but then if management try to micro-manage they are often then accused of excessive interference, but fatigue management plans (FMP’s) have been around for many years and give both management and workers a template to work from and specify actions to take when FMP alarms are activated.

Like many professionals, pilots often find that they are subject to criticism by people who can’t actually do the job; it’s well known that some of the best ship-handlers are standing on the quayside. Likewise, managers of businesses are too frequently derided by workers who would fare dismally if placed in a management position.

However, if company policy is to provide a 24/7/365 service then manning (and womaning? Non-gender specific peopling?) for the peaks and enduring the over peopling of the troughs is inevitable. In small ports, the big shipping companies seem to dictate that this full service is required, so it’s up to port management to manage and workers to assist in implementing safety management policy and practice on fatigue. On such important safety issues no-one should lose sight of the fact that working together, walking the walk as well as talking the talk is the way forward.

Tired of reading about fatigue? Then get this? We had a visit from Royalty at the end of February as the Queen Mary 2, having bypassed us last year, decided to call in this season having seen the Ovation of the Seas do it a few times already. “What a beautiful ship!” I heard a lot of people say as she transited the harbour. So is it just me that thinks she’s as ugly as a bulldog licking piss off a nettle? The freeboard, designed to make her extra stable during her North Atlantic ferry duties, and the charcoal, so dark blue it’s black, paint, make her look like a pot-bellied old codger with his trousers pulled right up into his crotch. And the stern? What happened there? I know she’s been designed with more than just a nod to the old Queen Mary with a couple of azipods slipped in where hopefully no-one notices, but the referendum as whether to fit a cruiser or transom stern must have been closer than Brexit because it’s resulted in a 50-50 split with a cruiser stern hanging off a transom. Ugly as… but that’s what you get when you build a Cunarder in France and they base the design on a Citroen 2CV. The original, launched in 1934 at John Brown’s yard on the River Clyde, would never have been allowed out the naval architects office looking like that. The original basso profundo steam whistle was impressive though, even on compressed air.

22 years later in 1956 and just upstream from John Brown’s, Charles Connell & Co’s men would have been building the original Glenpark for J&J Denholm Limited, the Glasgow based family firm with whom both your esteemed editor and I served our time. Ed went on to sail as Cadet Training Officer on the sister ship Wellpark (built at Mitsubishi in Hiroshima in 1977) where I did two trips as cadet, although our paths never crossed at the same point. Having sailed as cadet on the previous Glenpark, imagine Ed’s paroxysms of delight as he piloted Glenpark’s latest top quality Naikai Zosen (Innoshima) built manifestation into Port Chalmers; and in the office, much to the bemusement of those present, we spontaneously broke into verse commissioned by J&J Denholms spirtle-whittler and penned by Bardy McBardie, an under-appreciated and often under the influence prodigy of Robert Burns…

“Doon the Glen came the Denholm’s men

Like a line of ballet dancers

Two in ten were time-served men

And the rest were fucking chancers!”

 (CH)