Abandonment of sailors

The Mount Whitney has zero business in a foreign shipyard.

Zero.

[QUOTE=salt’n steel;166629]Are we that dumb?[/QUOTE]

That has to be the best example of a rhetorical question I have seen here in a long time.

It is as if Max Hardberger and John McCain were suddenly running the DoD and MarAd.

[QUOTE=Johnny Canal;166625]And this is part of why MSC is such a fucking joke. What a great reputation MSC has… can’t get a relief when your time is up, but when you do, the POS Captain tells you to break out your own plastic to get yourself home because nobody can find you a seat on an American-owned bird.
But yet somehow we have a USN Warship going through a major maintenance overhaul at a [B][U]Croatian shipyard since January 2015[/U][/B] and somebody is worried about whether CIVMARS fly United vs Cuba Libre Airways?
This just gets better and better. Has there been an announcement as to what caused the fire on Mount Whitney? And who can explain why they are there for major overhaul? I understand a need for emergency repair in a foreign yard, but come on. ow many jobs have been lost in US shipyards since January 2015?

Yes, MMP, MEBA, and SIU represent in some twisted manner the CIVMARS on MSC ships.[/QUOTE]
If those lads are MMP, they do have options and need to go screaming to either their closest hall or better yet to HQ (probably less $ for them to get there than it cost them to get home!) Not to mention MMP does have specific govt contract personnel who I am certain would assist. Tell them to get ahold of Lars Turner or Klaus Lutha, they will take up the cause. Certain they can take it higher too if needed.

[QUOTE=DeckApe;166603]No, I laid out the facts as they are. These kids have been waiting for transportation home. They remained on the ship while this played out and not in a hotel or street corner ashore. The company and its travel agency tried but were unable to provide them with travel back to the U.S.

The way I see it the master had three legal options 1) have them buy their transportation then immediately reimburse them the cost of that transportation 2) bring the mates along as riders until transportation from another port was available 3) put them up in a hotel after the ship departed until transportation was available.

If I had to guess I’d say the office didn’t permit any of these options and just shrugged the problem off on the master. After all the office pukes are not liable, he is. I’m sure there’s some further backstory in the master’s in-box.

I guess there was option four: he could have invited them into his office, explained the situation, asked for their understanding and given them his assurance that no matter what happens he would personally see to it that they were made whole. That would have been classy. Instead he had the purser do his dirty work.[/QUOTE]

There is another option.

There have been a few times when I have reached into my own pocket and put my own cash in crewmen’s hands to travel home on. Sometimes I have been reimbursed and sometimes I haven’t.

Fuckin right I’d rip it up with a pile of reciepts, at the vest least they should get reimbursed for hotel/meals/flights.

Why couldn’t the master throw them $500 each from the ships stash? He would have a legitimate reason for dong so.

[QUOTE=The Commodore;166641]If those lads are MMP, they do have options and need to go screaming to either their closest hall or better yet to HQ (probably less $ for them to get there than it cost them to get home!) Not to mention MMP does have specific govt contract personnel who I am certain would assist. Tell them to get ahold of Lars Turner or Klaus Lutha, they will take up the cause. Certain they can take it higher too if needed.[/QUOTE]

How are they going to get to the union hall if they are too scared to go down the gangway after they’ve been paid off?

Both mates have departed for home. What they chose to do now is up to them. I hope they read the different advice given here before they do whatever it is they decide to do.

For my part, I advised a measured approach. After all a good helmsman uses only enough rudder to stay a course. If they’re reimbursed in full and with no trouble they could consider this a lesson in how not to behave in their future careers. If there is trouble then they should apply increasing pressure in accordance to the resistance until they are repaid.

Of course I wouldn’t fault them if they lit the bonfires - I enjoy a good fireworks show - but I hope they don’t burn any bridges they need to cross in the future.

^^^ If I missed this I apologize but did the two mates get signed off on less than mutual circumstances? I worked on TAGOS in my early career and flew myself home from Scotland after deciding against two back to back 90 day rotations. The outfit was U.S. Marine Management where 3M pay was pretty bad and I was applicant status at AMO. I accepted the fact I had to eat the ticket but it was time to go.

No, it was by the book.

[QUOTE=The Commodore;166585]WTF? And folks wonder why MSC gets a bad rap. If they were on Articles, which I have never sailed MSC direct, but MSC contract and we were, the Master is responsible for getting these mates back to their port of engagement. Never have I heard such a fate as this on a US Flag ship. I have watched the old man fire guys in foreign ports, but as stated previously, he was still responsible to ensure their passage back home, via local agent. I cannot believe these guys are Union either, else shame on them for not contacting the Union. Regardless, what an embarassment, this is the type story you read about on gCaptain about a FoC ship dumping crew, not US Flag. Those mates should not let it go quietly, they do have a leg to stsnd on.[/QUOTE]

Unless MSC contracts are very differant from the commercial side; once crew members are paid off, by contract, mariner transportation is the company’s responsibility, not the master’s.

The master works for the company so some travel related tasks that have to be done aboard are usually done by the master (or the purser) but the ultimate responsibility for repatriation and so forth is, by contract, the company’s.

Honest question. Is this not trumped by federal law when the company is not holding up their end of the bargain, which would then lay the responsibility upon the master?

What lm1883 said likely.

The contract has an entire section on travel, the requirements are much higher then the law.

Seems like the master would have to know that the company wasn’t able to meet contractual obligatons then do this:

§2195. Abandonment of sailors
Whoever, being master or commander of a vessel of the United States, while abroad, maliciously and without justifiable cause forces any officer or mariner of such vessel on shore, in order to leave him behind in any foreign port or place, or refuses to bring home again all such officers and mariners of such vessel whom he carried out with him, as are in a condition to return and willing to return, when he is ready to proceed on his homeward voyage, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

So that’d be very unlikely.

If someone agreed to pay say, $25 an hour then refused to pay it’d be breech of contract not a violaton of the minimum wage law. The contract has a higher requirement then the law.

[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;166701]What lm1883 said likely.

The contract has an entire section on travel, the requirements are much higher then the law.

Seems like the master would have to know that the company wasn’t able to meet contractual obligatons then do this (abandon sailors).

So that’d be very unlikely.[/QUOTE]

Except that’s EXACTLY what happened according to what we know. The company told the master “we’re not paying to fly them home and they can’t stay on the ship.”. Then the master followed the orders of the company to violate the law and abandon them.

[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;166701]If someone agreed to pay say, $25 an hour then refused to pay it’d be breech of contract not a violaton of the minimum wage law. The contract has a higher requirement then the law.[/QUOTE]

No, it would be a violation of BOTH because %0 is less than both the contacted wage and the minimum wage.

(BTW, I don’t recall any mention of this vessel being union or under a contract of any kind.)

I think wage theft is a criminal act too.

[QUOTE=Capt. Phoenix;169508]Except that’s EXACTLY what happened according to what we know. The company told the master “we’re not paying to fly them home and they can’t stay on the ship.”. Then the master followed the orders of the company to violate the law and abandon them.

No, it would be a violation of BOTH because %0 is less than both the contacted wage and the minimum wage.

(BTW, I don’t recall any mention of this vessel being union or under a contract of any kind.)[/QUOTE]

This is MSC, they have contracts with the maritime unions, but in either case MSC (or the company) is responsible for reparation of mariners, not the master.

a. U.S. owners or operators of United States merchant ships are responsible
for the repatriation of all seamen (seamen of any nationality who are
serving on a vessel of the U.S.) separated from their vessels at foreign
ports for any reason (ill or injured) including stragglers, except in cases of
desertion, shipwreck or other acts of misconduct by the mariner. You
should inform the seamen needing assistance, or the
individual/organization that contacted you, that your office is available to
assist seamen of the United States as appropriate. (See 46 U.S.C.
10318(e)).

[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;169520]This is MSC, they have contracts with the maritime unions, but in either case MSC (or the company) is responsible for reparation of mariners, not the master.[/QUOTE]

I didn’t know of that law, thanks. But it doesn’t mean that the master didn’t also violate the law when he knowingly abandoned the officers at the orders of the office. Maybe a good lawyer could get him off but likely both the master and the office could get in legal trouble.

In short, while it is the company’s responsibility to repatriate them the master [B]CANNOT[/B] legally put them off the vessel if the company has not provided travel arrangements and they are willing and able to stay on until a US port.

[QUOTE=Capt. Phoenix;169527]I didn’t know of that law, thanks. But it doesn’t mean that the master didn’t also violate the law when he knowingly abandoned the officers at the orders of the office. Maybe a good lawyer could get him off but likely both the master and the office could get in legal trouble.

In short, while it is the company’s responsibility to repatriate them the master [B]CANNOT[/B] legally put them off the vessel if the company has not provided travel arrangements and they are willing and able to stay on until a US port.[/QUOTE]

I’ve paid off a lot of crew over the years and I’m not aware of any requirement that travel arrangements have to be in hand before crew leave the ship. The idea that getting your travel arrangements after payoff instead of before is abandonment seems like a stretch even for the most active of mess-deck sea lawyers.

[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;169555]I’ve paid off a lot of crew over the years and I’m not aware of any requirement that travel arrangements have to be in hand before crew leave the ship. The idea that getting your travel arrangements after payoff instead of before is abandonment seems like a stretch even for the most active of mess-deck sea lawyers.[/QUOTE]

I’m going off the information we have, which is that the company told the master that they were NOT providing travel then he knowingly abandoned the sailors.

[QUOTE=DeckApe;166554]the company has been unable to provide travel back to the States due to a lack of flights. No cash was advanced to them. They were told to pay with their own credit cards.[/QUOTE]

Why hasn’t their union resolved this yet?

most likely the guys have no balls and won’t speak up because they would rather eat a shit sandwich than piss off a 23 year old KP or Mass grad in the office.