Gotcha, my understanding was that they called them second mates so they wouldn’t have 2 “Captains” on the boat, and it gave a clear line of authority.
Vane does the exact same thing on their ATBs…or at least they used to.
They did it because the company is run by tankermen that have no clue about the wheel house end of the business. There were a lot of suggestions: tankerman in charge, head tankerman, supervising tankerman, barge supervisor, senior tankerman etc.
They had a second mate when I was there that wanted a 100ton masters license. So they wrote him a seatime letter referencing his two years as second mate. NMC writes back WTF does a second mate need 100 tons for.
They never resolved the whole barge vs tug thing. Now with unmanned barges the tankermen live on the tug. They still have some tankermen that refuse to do maintenence on the tugs.
Lets call it what it is, the typical tug mate on an ATB is a spoiled cunt 
who likes to cry about what the next man isnt doing. There was 6 mates in the ENTIRE company who had to go over on the barge and pump WATER, not cargo. They squirmed their way out of it when the 80-100s came out. I had 10yrs over there. Some of the waterboys-2nd mates where half wits but alot of them did get a license or had a 3rds, the title was made to sound good to the oil companies / union contract, we typically had a deckhand with a 1600 for the 3rd man so it didnt matter. Im reformed tank trash that got a license, making 100+ a day over the tug mate but I dont remind him about it daily.
Geezus on a pogo stick, barge mate, barge supervisor etc. Are these even USCG licensed positions? If so why would a government agency invent such positions? Does any other country in the world have such a convoluted scheme for shipping?
The oil companies wanted a mate in charge, same as on a tanker. So the tug and barge companies started calling tankermen (who are not mates) “mates”. The oil companies are too stupid to know the difference. That doesn’t give me much confidence in the oil company vetting process.
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perhaps willful ignorance?
No, they’re company job titles.
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The fact of the matter is that someone who can JUST focus on tankering/the barge and have fewer other distractions is always going to be a better, safer tankerman than a mate who has to stand a wheel watch, contend with other additional wheelhouse duties, and handle cargo on top of that.
Regardless of whatever anyone else might have to say about the tug mates being whiny and them not earning their pay, there is no question whatsoever in my mind that a tankerman not distracted by duties in the wheelhouse will be a better tankerman, and a mate not distracted by cargo duties on the barge will be a better mate.
It is a more sensible division of labor and nothing will ever convince me that it is better in anyway to have ATB mates in charge of cargo operations. That is absolutely not the case no matter what anyone says.
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“Spoiled cunt” who drives the boat, signs the DOI, makes the load/DC plans tanks the barge and everything in between that requires even the smallest amount of responsibility.
Not all companies are created equal, the Atlantic, Pacific and the Gulf can be vastly different in what responsibilities certain positions have, at CLL the “Mate Tankerman” (That’s a real Mate with a license, Towing endorsement and PIC Barge for those interested not a “Barge Captain or Barge Mate” like they call them over on the East coast) have to do pretty much everything on the Tug (all paperwork, record keeping, reporting, drills, inspections, payroll etc) besides physically dock the barge…while only bringing in $25-35 more per day than an AB or even OS-Tankerman.
While we’re generalizing cunts sign me up for having to be told how to do the most basic of tasks like change oil and fill out a sample bottle, or even clean.
Sure would be nice with my biggest concern in the world being filling a tank up and then emptying a tank out once per week then sitting there during the entire 12 hour watch the rest of the hitch watching “Big Bank” videos on Instagram while bitching that someone peed on the toilet seat yesterday and think of ways that I could get out of maintenance work.
But I digress. Maybe you’re not so typical and perhaps the company you work at they are, but let’s not paint with such a broad brush.
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I can’t speak for what is going on today. I can say the chief mate and second mate at my last company were licensed officers and shared cargo ops while in port. Most did their own dockings and sailings. Stood a 4/8 watch at sea. Then 6/6 while in port loading and discharging.The abt’s were on each watch with them. Paid quite well, the shorter runs were very tough on all of us.Captain, CE, and AE took on stores/ fuel/etc during cargo ops.