[QUOTE=neutrino78x;173764]Cool, sounds like my understanding is correct. 
I was only talking about taking STCW myself in the event that MSC does not have anything entry level available right now and I decide I still want to try the surface ship thing.
I know STCW isn’t required for those little fishing boats and things like the Blue and Gold Fleet that stay in the San Francisco Bay, but those ships also don’t have crew cabins; everybody goes home at the end of the day. What’s the problem with that, you ask? Well, I live in Silicon Valley, which is 50 miles away from San Francisco on the southern end of San Francisco Bay. In fact I live in a suburb of Silicon Valley at the extreme south end of Santa Clara County. It takes an hour for me to get to downtown San Jose on transit and a total of 2-3 hours to get all the way to SF or Oakland. So it’s clearly not plausible for me to go from there all the way to SF or Oakland each day, especially at the early hour those boats probably work. Sure I could move, but until I do, I need to be able to get to work each day. Tesla’s production plant pays $17/hr, nearly double what I make now, but I can’t work there for the same reason; it’s in Fremont.
I didn’t realize this until today but apparently tugboats typically have a 14 days on, 14 off schedule, and they tend to live on the tugboat for that period. I didn’t even realize tugboats typically have racks! lol. So that might actually work, but the ones around here require STCW. Plus I’m really more interested in going out on The High Seas again.
Ah but my friend, my shipmate, submarines are intrinsically dangerous. We get paid slightly more (about $100 more per month when I was in) than surface sailors because it is “arduous duty”. I’ve been in two fires on a submarine. I’ve gone all the way down past test depth (it is classified but “greater than 800 feet”). We had a leaking periscope one time. Another time we had a leak in the missile compartment (both times we were submerged hundreds of feet down). I’ve been in a class 4 typhoon that made the boat roll and pitch 20 degrees in every direction. Then when we went down to 600 feet we felt nothing (but of course we were in danger from water pressure etc). I’ve been on missions in which the Captain ordered the US Flag taken down since we had to run on the surface briefly but he didn’t want them to realize a US submarine was present. One time we heard blast fishing on sonar and I told the sonar supervisor, “isn’t that illegal in [the country whose waters we were in at the time]?” and he said “yeah but we’re not going to report it” and I said “why” and he said “because we were never here.”
I spent two weeks removing all nonskid from the deck, I spent a week sanding the DSRV surfaces, which we had to redo three times because the shipyard worker said it was not smooth enough. One time one of the sanitary tanks overfilled and we had to wipe human waste off the deck. 24 to 48 hours spent awake was typical, and one time I spent 4 days awake doing operations. From what I understand, that last part never happens in MSC since they are paid by the hour. Submarines have an 18 hour day, six hours on, twelve hours “off” (there’s been talk of changing it to a 24 hour day, 8 hours on 16 “off”).
You see, to me that is adventure. The hard work is just the price of admission, lol. Some men would prefer a desk job – and I certainly have the skills (though not the credentials, yet) to get a very well paying one – whereas others are interested in adventure. I am in the latter category.
I read an old article in Navy Times where the Captain of an MSC vessel said it is good for those who enjoyed going to sea when they were in the Navy but didn’t like the Navy itself as a job. I’m definitely one of those lol! I was a PAPERCLIP…“people against people ever reenlisting, civilian life is preferred” lol. Look carefully for Navy enlisted guys who have a paperclip on their uniform somewhere subtle…those are the cool ones lol.
But then again, both of these careers I could potentially get into – IT and surface ships – require investment. The investment required for surface ships is a lot greater. CCNA, an entry level cert for IT, is a $150 test. STCW, an entry level requirement for mariners, is $1500. But if MSC has an entry level job available, I intend to pursue it, since I would not have to pay for STCW in that case. If not, well, the surface ship thing will have to wait. I may end up never doing it. Let’s see what MSC says in a couple weeks. :)[/QUOTE]
A “paperclip” ? What the hell is that ? some kind of gay thing ? The USN that I served this country in Didn’t wear " paperclips " . Especially If you were in deck dep. Some BM2 would probably give you a quick tour of the chain locker for something stupid like that while one of the Chiefs held the hatch.
Of course you are talking about the submarine navy,180 crew go out and 90 couples come back.
Pull your head out" sailor ", (and I use the term loosely), The men on this site have started out the hard way and have put their time in to get where they are now. (without a G D paperclip), and For some reason, they are still trying to help you .
Heed their advise, or do it on your own. And stop knocking any part of this industry that you know very little about.
Your looking for an adventure ? Go camping with your paperclip buddies or find some far away land that hates our way of life, and go bother them.
You’ve got a long way to go sport.
Mikeboat
