I’m noticing a common trend that a lot of captains these days are afraid to get on the sticks. Lately I’ve noticed they put a majority if not all of the work involving boat handling on the mates or Chief Mate, and in the rare instance they do take the sticks, they get very shaky. I’ve even seen some completely leave the wheelhouse during maneuvering to “avoid” any responsibility if an incident did occur.
The way I see it, if the mate or chief mate crashes, the master will still be accountable no matter what.
I try and let my mates get the lion share of stick time for experience, but that’s exactly why I stand by to jump in and take over if things go sideways.
I’m responsible anyway, so let me get in there and take the brunt of the office’s wrath for denting their darling so that the mate “can live to fight another day” so to speak. And if I have doubts about some machinery repair that Boudreaux from the maintenance department did, you better believe that I’m the one on the sticks for the first couple moves afterwards.
Not OSVs, but on other vessels I have sailed with captains who were not “naturals” on the sticks, and in at least one case did seem to want to flee the wheelhouse to avoid having to take responsibility for a situation.
While I know it’s the captain’s job to train those coming up, my mates often had to be pretty forceful to wedge themselves between the sticks and me. That’s one of the few fun parts of the job, if you ask me.
I’ve worked with some Captains who recommend promoting a Chief Mate to Captain just to get rid of them because they are ineffective in their current role. It’s easier to promote someone than to have them dismissed.
When these individuals “fail upwards” to a Captain’s position, they often rely on a competent Chief Mate to handle their responsibilities.
Another significant problem in the industry is Captains logging fraudulent DP hours to obtain and revalidate DP certificates. I’ve heard of Captains who have never been near the DP desk yet receive their DP tickets. This issue is particularly prevalent on larger offshore vessels. Genuine logging of DP hours seems rare; hardly any Captains spend the required two hours at the desk to earn a legitimate DP day.
Not to get off-topic and go into DP vs manual boat handling, but that’s the Nautical Institute’s fault there on that one. According to them, that’s acceptable. Because of their overall responsibility for the vessel, the NI recognizes that as DP time.
“Masters holding a DP certificate can claim for the DP sea time due to their direct responsibility for and supervision of the DP operations. In this case, the DP sea time shall be recorded in the NI or IMCA logbook, signed and stamped as the DP Master.”
(Edit: or are you talking about their initial issuance? I was thinking revalidation)
A buddy does insurance claims and had a captain that was asleep still get blamed for a crash.
Not sure how running off at the last minute would help a captain get out of anything???
One of the aspects of the job I enjoyed.
As I moved hire up. I found i was doing more watching than doing.
Part of the job.
My particular vessel, was under less time pressure than others. We had a reputation as a good place to learn. Most of us who worked there would teach and allow junior watchkeepers to do a lot more.
I even went out of my way on some occasions to see just how little i could do. Like Tom Sawyer getting my fence white washed.
You still have to be there and you delegate a task but you cant delegate responsibility.
My usual requirement “Just don’t make me have to put my coffee down”
BRM. ect. “It’s much easier for the Master to question the Mate” than the other way round. Personality thing.
As a Master suggesting to the mate it might be a good idea to slow down.
Is going to get a better response.
The truth is I’d often just rather do it myself.
I spent quite a bit of time working on smaller vessels with smaller crew where as Master I was also a watch keeper. We taught the QM’s to do most everything.
Particularly with RAD,s ect.
I did a lot myself.
I particularly liked to have an experienced QM who could understand the ship handling in fog when making blind approaches.
I had occasion to be on the sticks over the shoulders of the mate sitting in the chair when he misjudged the current and we got a close and unhealthy look at the gear teeth of the jack up rig. Did I regret letting him drive. Hell no. After a couple of months he ended up a very competent ship handler.
I’ve worked with some utterly useless captains who delegate almost all their duties to subordinates.
On paper, these captains have fantastic skills and experience reflected in their CVs. However, in reality, they can’t do anything and just delegate everything away.
A captain should know how to do the jobs of a chief mate and second mate; they should understand the roles of the people beneath them. How can they help new, inexperienced staff members learn if they can’t do the job themselves? How can they assess if someone is doing a good job if they can’t even perform the tasks themselves?
I’ve worked with some captains who are excellent ship handlers but let the chief mates and second mates do all the maneuvering to gain experience. That’s a completely different situation from a captain not doing any driving because he can’t.
On the other end of the spectrum, you have captains who hardly let anyone else handle the ship. That’s not good either because subordinates should be given a chance to learn.
A number of years ago, I joined a new ship type that I had never been on before. It was a new ship, and both myself and the other DPO were new to the company and the vessel. The captain, however, had been working for several years on one of the sister vessels that was almost identical. We joined thinking that the captain would be able to help us out if we were stuck, because there were a few things we were not familiar with. But the captain was of no use whatsoever. It seemed like he had never touched the DP desk on the sister vessel; he didn’t know how to switch between the different modes—DP to joystick to manual. That is the extreme basics, and he couldn’t do it himself. It was mind-blowing how little he knew. I didn’t spend long on that vessel, but it has since had a major incident, which doesn’t surprise me.
I definitely haven’t experienced this, and I feel like it’s way outside the norm. Certainly captains aren’t at the controls often these days because there are so many brand new mates needing the stick time to get trained up, but that’s as it should be. I’ve not worked with or heard of a captain who’s shy about taking over in a tight situation, or rough weather, things like that. I feel like word would spread pretty quickly about anyone who’s afraid to do that. How recently are these observations being made? I just don’t see it myself in the last few years…
That used to be the norm back in the days. When you got promoted to Master was the first time you got to do any shiphandling.
May not have mattered all that much on larger ships, where the only “hands-on shiphandling” done by the Master would be slowing down and give lee to let the pilot board. (On some rear occasions, actually anchor the ship on an open anchorage).
outside of the GoM, where everyone can drive, you get to the issue:
Unlimited Masters in theory can manage a vessel ( thats the IMO standard)
That was the IMO’s statement when collecting data from most flag states.
They also said to the Nautical Institute that no flag state had as a requirement that you can drive a boat to get your license.
Issue came to a head with DP.
Early days every DP captain I worked for had a story where he got lucky and somebody taught them.
I was driving twin engined pleasureboats since a teenager so no issue for me like many Americans.
For sure its an ongoing issue as its not part of a deck ticket.
There is a whisper that flag states might take over DP training so they will own the problem and so they should as they created it.
Imagine the mess ( they tried to lumber the DP schools with this)
This guy can drive so he can be a captain of a dp classed vessel and this one cant (as decided by the school.)so …he is… unemployed
Nautical colleges need to go back to sailing dinghys
Wow, that’s surprising. You’d think guys like that would get a reputation real quick and get run out of town. Never heard of such a thing, I’ve worked with the good the bad and the ugly and have plenty of colorful things to say about some, but never a captain afraid of the stick! Hope that’s not a trend.
They’re usually connected to someone high up in management is how they don’t get forced out it seems. We finally got one to give up sailing at my company when he couldn’t pass medical… so they gave him a job in the office.
I’ve seen it both ways, ones that won’t give up the chair and ones that never take the chair. I’m comfortable either way. The ones that truly stink are the ones that are simply mascots and don’t do anything at all and you get stuck with every shift, docking and all of the paperwork.
