I had an opportunity to work on tugs on the Columbia River before I went deep sea. One never knows about the road not taken but I do wonder from time to time if that’d been the wiser choice.
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Sticker shock and yard availability is what I had heard. There is also a significant learning curve between operating cutter suction dredges and then making a jump to trailing suction hopper dredges. Quite a difference when it comes to crewing them, hoppers require a fully licensed crew like any other ocean going SOLAS vessel compared to no credentials at all for CSD crew.
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A hopper dredge does not have mostly uncertificated “industrial workers” (welders, mechanics, arm operators, etc ?
Cutterhead and bucket dredges, yes. Hopper dredges are crewed 100% with MMC carrying seafarers in my experience. Although we did carry riding crews of mechanics and shipyard workers from time to time.
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