In 1997 I was Master for a trip from Singapore to Thailand on a Drillship that had the wheelhouse aft and obviously the derrick amidships. View from the wheelhouse was equally obviously very limited.
A CCTV camera that was installed in the derrick could be turned to look ahead, with a small display on the bridge. To me that did not meet the requirement of the RoR, so I placed two Roustabouts on lookout, one on each wing, day and night. This did not go down well with the Toolpusher, who reckoned that they would be more useful for other tasks. (No other Captain had asked for something like this before etc. etc.)
A couple of years later they had a collision in Singapore Strait and got part of the blame because of the lack of free view ahead and no lookouts, although the other ship was found to be in breach of other rules and mainly to blame.
The propulsion of the Dutch inland tanker Greenstream is fully LNG-electric so that no gas oil is used. With this system the emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) are reduced by more than 25% and 80% respectively. In addition, no sulfur oxide (SO2) and particulate matter is released. The ship is equipped with four engines allowing a flexible consumption of energy.
Unlike traditional inland tankers, the Greenstreamâs wheelhouse is situated on the bow of the ship. This ensures better trim and potentially a higher safety level because the skipper has a better view. On the other hand in case of a frontal collision the forward location of wheelhouse and accommodation is less safe for the crew. The wheelhouse is collapsible so that a crawl line of 4.50 meters is feasible. Beneath the wheelhouse is the accommodation for the crew. The engines are on the back of the ship, so the engine noise hardly penetrates into the crewâs accommodation.
Ships of not less than 55 m in length shall meet the following SOLAS requirements:
The view of the sea surface from the conning position shall not be obscured by more than two ship lengths, or 500 m, whichever is the less, forward of the bow to 10° on either side under all conditions of draught, trim and deck cargo.
No blind sector caused by cargo, cargo gear or other obstructions outside of the wheelhouse forward of the beam which obstructs the view of the sea surface as seen from the conning position, shall exceed 10°. The total arc of blind sectors shall not exceed 20°. The clear sectors between blind sectors shall be at least 5°. However, in the view described in .1, each individual blind sector shall not exceed 5°.
And there are of course more requirements for navigation bridge visibility.
Itâs already been thought of. Plaquemines parish wants to build a container terminal near Bell Chasse to load shallow draft inland container ships, of a design similar to what you posted, for shipment up the Mississippi River system to inland ports. Canât find the article right now. But itâs been talked about over the last few years.
I read some more articles about it yesterday, it appears the interested parties are still working towards their shared goal? If any checks have been cashed or ground broken, I donât know.
I had to go back a wee way. The problem was there is not much wrong with relying on the mark one eyeball to read the draft on coastal vessels. One Ro- Ro ship I know had a calibrated stick that was put down the side of the ramp to read the after draft.
The vessel I was referring to was a large container ship where the journey from the cargo office to read the drafts and return took a good 20 minutes.
We sailed from Southampton on the Tokyo Bay the difference between the manifest and shipâs draft was 2000 metric tonnes. Fortunately, we had capacity to ballast down. Nowadays ballast tanks are minimised to save cost, inspections and coatings such that we now have a situation with tankers that they can use sea water as ballast in cargo tanks in an emergency and the main issue with doing that is lack of shore receiving facilities. So now we are reverting to the â70âsâŚ
We had two of those short sea ships trading to the Pacific Islands. I was mate of one years ago. The pallet loaders were on the port side and they had a negative GM light ship.
The stories from those vessels are legendary and are best published posthumously.
The good old days ⌠I canât find it online but there was a poster on every tanker that showed a salty mate with a leg up on the rail watching ballast water flow overboard from a hose. The only thing missing was a cigarette hanging from his lips.
