The fact that you can only find unhealthy older people and that you stick to the ridiculous 6 and 6 work schedule may be related.
I wonder how those people became shuffling obese trainwrecks? Hmmm…
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The problem is that too many of the skilled and experienced guys who have adapted to this lifestyle are in their 60s and 70s, and are retiring, and there are not enough new guys to replace them.
I got a pm from a kid the other day claiming he wants to work, has to be in cellphone range most of the time. That’s a kid that does not want to work.
We just saw a woman say that she cannot work 6 and 6.
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Older does not equal unhealthy or obese or a train wreck.
Maybe the current nationwide tugboat crew shortage will eventually result in hiring more crew, and a change to the 4-8 watch system.
Younger people, many of whom are fat or unhealthy, are not interested in being beyond good internet and cell service. Nor are they interested in being away from home for extended periods of time.
In this current job market there is flexibility to sail on your own terms. Timely crew changes, competitive pay, good benefits, room for advancement, good equipment, etc…
As we have said before it’s impossible to find a place where we can check all the boxes, but the ball is in our court right now. We can be picky.
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Yes. This is the best job maritime job market I’ve ever seen. It has been brought about by covid, retirements, USCG requirements, the NMC Disaster, work from home or a coffee shop in paradise, a flood of government hand outs and economic stimulus, the revival of the offshore oil patch, competitive shoreside opportunities, etc.
Now is the time to be saying “show me the money, and improve life onboard.”
Hard to say how long it will last. Probably longer than I will.
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I hired a full crew of young people at the beginning of the summer. They all worked extremely hard and didn’t complain once. They were all in excellent shape. They worked for 3 months straight.
It’s possible that young people aren’t the problem here. Nor ‘them dang cell phones’. If you refuse to provide basic amenities to your crew despite multiple affordable options that says more about your toxic outlook than young people, and explains why you can’t find crew.
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I worked with a guy so heavy that he had to use a special step to get on the helicopter since the one built into the door wasn’t rated for over 300 pounds.
Based on his position he was on the fire team. He did have a custom suit, and would probably suck down a bottle faster than most, but he could move surprisingly quick and move large objects.
I see the point that he would be difficult to rescue. Perhaps impossible. But I don’t think being rescued is a job requirement, as morbid as that thought may be.
He was quite good at the job he was hired for though, and according to the doctor that signed his physical form he was qualified.
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Apples and oranges.
Our 60 something year old top notch (you would call him an unhealthy obsessive train wreck) engineer left us for a highline fishing boat and tripled his income. Unfortunately, we cannot compete with that. I wish we could.
There is no comparison between hiring green kids without MMCs to go fishing with the gold rush mentality of maybe striking it rich in a few months, or making a commitment to learn the tugboat trade and work ones way up over time for a smaller guaranteed income career.
Tugboat owners had it easy for years with a big surplus of qualified mariners to choose from. That kept pay low and declining relative to inflation. No need to improve the quality of life onboard.
It took time, but now the surplus of qualified mariners is suddenly gone. Owners are stunned and don’t know how to respond. Pay certainly needs to increase, and truthfully, business is good and they can afford it. The 50 year old fleet of boats needs to be replaced and more amenities need to be provided.
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There absolutely is. Every job can be presented in a way that it’s an awesome adventure for the right person. Even tug work. If you don’t put the work in to fit the job to the people available then you won’t get committed people. It has always been this way.
People has difficulty manning 250 years ago, and they have difficulty manning now. Good sailors get the job done and poor ones bitch. Just as it always was.
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I think the person suggesting a retirement age meant a federal, CFR enforced retirement age.
Right there. What are basic amenities? I consider them to be a comfortable bunk w/a privacy curtain and good quality food with a fair budget…but that’s me.
Newer people to this industry expect wifi, sat tv, gym equipment, and their own room/head. I call those perks…but they are becoming necessities to attract people.
I personally feel at this point in my career I can be selective and have ‘some’ of the above perks, and I do…but especially in the tugboat world, it’s hard to find a lot of these perks, if not all.
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Yesterday’s frills and extravagances are today’s necessities.
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Hope you were in the GoM or along a US coast line somewhere. A simple thing like a cut hand can be a real hassle & serious incident in open water or while international. A heart attack or stoke can easily be a death sentence overseas or when days from port. If a crewmember can’t get up to use the head on the plane without causing a scene or needs a special fat person seatbelt adapter they have no business flying out of the country to work.
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Unfortunately to do that we’d definitely have to do something about the lack of available personnel, which spins us back to not being able to break from 6:6’s. Heck, my unlicensed guys are begging for even time and HR can’t find enough people to pull that off either.
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I don’t know if it was just the company I worked for or if others do this…but if you worked overseas you got a company physical every two years or so, very thorough and from their selected 3rd party. If you worked in the US it was a physical when hired and then never again. Guess they had faith in proximity and quality of US hospitals.
I don’t know if the policy stuck but in the early 2000’s I was working with Tidewater the week they implemented a policy of requiring physicals before international deliveries. I was on a crew prepping an OSV for delivery when the vessel that left a month before had a medical emergency in Nigeria. It was decided to give physicals to the next departing crew while giving any needed shots & Malaron prescriptions. 3 guys didn’t pass & 1 was in such bad shape he claimed short term disability benefits. It might of saved his life. That dude’s ankles were full of water & nearly as thick as my thigh.
There are certain job requirements and emergency response duties. Each of those have physical requirements. That’s what you must continuously prove every 2 years, every year if a pilot. Whether it’s a man, a woman, a pink elephant, or a unicorn is inconsequential. The standard is what it is.
Most injuries that I’ve had to deal was not if a person was out of shape; most cases, it was a reasonably fit person going past their limits and trying to muscle up on something in a manual handling situation. Extra help, a mechanical hoist/crane, or a hand truck would have prevented the injury.
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The USCG physicals (and most pre hires) are not intensive enough to result in many failures. Without going angiograms on guys over 50 (maybe over 40 for smokers) , I don’t think that these physicals have much predictive value.
It would be interesting to know the USCG failure rate. They must have that statistic.
A friend at MSC says they have a lot of really HUGE guys. Many older guys too. I bet they have some interesting statistics.
Well. I agree, and disagree. I am a retired Coast Guardsman, who has already sailed an additional 20 years to my 20 years in the Coast Guard. I get checked ANNUALLY on my own, in addition to the CG mandated 2-year STCW physical. I have met some guys, older than me, who are doing well at sea. Setting an age limit, I believe, is unfair. I live in the Philippines, and their annual overseas STCW physical requires a stress test, for my age group. They are also pretty stringent on seeing, hearing and physical ability. They also require blood tests and dental checkups. I believe, it is everyone’s responsibility to prepare and keep themselves able for work; including in emergency situations. I have found it difficult to judge by age, as many older sailors are in better shape than younger ones. I will keep on sailing, to the best of my ability, until I can no longer meet the requirements. I will probably make that decision before others will make it for me.
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I always wanted my own room and head. Didn’t always get them. . . and made due. Even now, when I spend time offshore (not in a crew member capacity), I rarely get it. Want it? Sure.
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