Don’t know anything about what happened yet other than it is an AML barge and that it is flooding in the stern. [Screenshot_20251118-161501_Facebook (1)]

[image] ombugge: I’m driving at the fact that in the Strait of Juan de Fuca there are compulsory pilotage and few groundings: Pilots embark and disembark at either Victoria or Port Angeles. The remaining majority of the Straits are transitted with only VTS coverage. There are few groundings from the fact that the strait is 15miles wide and pretty much one course in and out. Now, why were you specifically asking about the US side of the strait? There is only one TSS and VTS for it…inbound traffic on the American side and outbound on the Canadian.

[image] freighterman1: It was seldom a big deal until the rise of the internet and YouTube. The latter raises local news story to regional crisis overnight. The only crisis is that created by the Heiltsuk Nation’s jumping up and down screaming how their precious ancestral waters are being so heinously violated even when there is no impact like just this past week. I said it before but after the NATHAN E. STEWART they (read their mouthpiece William Housty here) have seized the political narrative and now demand so much regulation from Canada as to make it no longer viable for US vessel operators like Coastal to transit the Inside and to get an ever increasing pipeline of cash from their government at the same time! I fully see them soon demanding transit fees in the guise of being needed to keep the IP free of pollution. Even though that is prohibited by treaty, I am sure they will find a way to cram that down everyone’s throat because of all this power they have amassed. Why will Victoria or Ottawa care since these tolls will be paid by Americans? Do you and all the other US operators who use the IP believe you have muscle enough to push back on this or will it be better to negotiate the fees and pay them the tribute they demand than to fight this? Sadly, the US needs that access to the IP much more than any Canadian vessels need access to US waters. How much effort do you think the US Federal government will make to prevent such fees being imposed in today’s climate between the two nations? This will only get worse over time as we have seen already since 2016. Soon every US operator will have to decide if going the Inside route is even worth the misery of keeping the Heiltsuk’s beak forever wetted?

[image] ombugge: No. I’m driving at the fact that in the Strait of Juan de Fuca there are compulsory pilotage and few groundings: The number of vessels on the SJDF exempt from pilotage greatly exceed the number of vessels that require it. Fishing vessels below 5000-tons (and that is nearly all US fishing vessels) do not require pilotage, and plenty are just shy of 300’ LOA. Tugs are exempt for the most part, and they are the most numerous of commercial vessels in the area. Lots of ferries in Admiralty Inlet/Elliot Bay. No pilots on them. Big yachts, many super-yachts. No pilots. Groundings of these smaller classes of vessels are not unknown. They just don’t cause any problems. The locals worry about catastrophic oil spills. Oil tankers are piloted and escorted so they aren’t a big threat. The truth is when a 1600-ton vessel hits a rock and gets holed the double-bottoms are breached, and sea water rushes in more than oil rushes out. That’s a rule of thumb and there are plenty of exceptions to this, but having studied groundings on the IP and up in Western Alaska for thirty years I’ve found this to be the case. That’s why the local pilotage regs have evolved to what they are over the last hundred years.

Can’t remember what year it was, but there was that one foreign ship that missed the dogleg left turn and continued on until stopped by the beach. This was way before the pilot station, so he was operating all hobbledy-bobbledy and uncontrolled. Now we’re supposed to check in with traffic before the turn so they can make sure we’re awake.

No. I’m driving at the fact that in the Strait of Juan de Fuca there are compulsory pilotage and few groundings It honestly would be pretty hard to run aground in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, especially given it has an established TSS for Eastbound/Westbound traffic. Any vessel of size that manages to run aground in the Strait of Juan de Fuca really messed up and would likely never make it through even some of the widest and straightest portions of the Inside Passage.

“Lots of ferries in Admiralty Inlet/Elliot Bay. No pilots on them.” First Class pilotage required

[image] Rock_Hill: It honestly would be pretty hard to run aground in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, especially given it has an established TSS for Eastbound/Westbound traffic. Haven’t the recent noteworthy incidents been to loss of propulsion which is a risk not readily mitigated by compulsory pilotage.

This is a great point! In fact you can look at the Bouchard grounding in Buzzards Bay (2003) as a pivotal event. As a result it was compulsory pilotage, 2 licensed personnel in the wheelhouse and an escort tug for anything moving more than 5000 bbls. Even now an escort is still required.

[image] KemalPamouk: Now we’re supposed to check in with traffic before the turn so they can make sure we’re awake. The southbound check in at Tide Point in Rosario is for the same reason (and doesn’t apply to piloted vessels). That came after a certain company ran a container barge into Belle Rock in 2011.

The Centerline ATB was actually an HMS ATB at the time. The port pin of the Articoupler system had lost pressure which it had done at least twice before. These failures in that system were not properly addressed prior to the barge ejection South of Goose Islands. What is also not known to many is that another captain had refused the transit because of the prevailing weather conditions. He was replaced by the “hero” who was good enough to get two people on the barge and drop the anchor. Also worth noting is that fact that the barge had no tangible retrieval system connection to the barge. To put it simply. They got lucky.

Alaska to Seattle AML barge in trouble near Bella Bella BC

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Alaska to Seattle AML barge in trouble near Bella Bella BC

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