The Scourge of the American Petroleum Tankers That Prowl the British Columbia Coast - by INGMAR LEE (U.S. ATBs)

This makes it look like the Pacific Pilotage Authority had the authority to change the regs on their own.

Here is a picture of the Dutch flagged sea going tug ‘Fairplay 23’ with at the port side the skiff covered by a blue tarpaulin and the launching crane. In this business a good work boat is essential both for salvage and towing operations. I cannot see how you can do without it, eerie.

IMG_3481

  • Towing Hook Seebeck 55 tons.

  • 2 x Ulstein Brattvaag SL50 1 T brake load 125 tons 1.400 / 1.400 m towing wire

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It appears that PPA is the only pilotage rulemaking authority in BC. However, I have no idea how their rulemaking process works or how long it takes.

An April 2018 Transport Canada study, that I haven’t read yet, makes a lot of nationwide and location specific pilotage recommendations. I assume that most of these sweeping recommendations would require action by Trudeau and the Canadian Parliament. Undoubtedly, some could be done by the PPA. Among them, is a recommendation that BC Indian Tribes be given a seat on the PPA board of directors.

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Nice looking tug. There are not many tugs of that quality and capability in the US. Most of the coastwise fleet is 40 to 50 years old.

There are a lot of new ASD Harbor tugs and a few new modern coastwise tugs.

I can see a place for ATB’s around the Northern Territories of Australia and Indonesia as long as they repaired to some safe haven when there was a cyclone warning.
South of that no chance. If they have trouble in a 4 metre swell and 50 knots the unit wouldn’t survive summer never mind the winter.

2 posts were split to a new topic: Dutch Tugs

Environment Canada

There’s more than just Haida People who have a stake in those fisheries, even some white people.

If it weren’t for public opinion, many irresponsible practices would go unchecked as long as they offered short-term, short-sighted profits.

Given that coastal First Nations, particularly around Bella Bella, have thousands of years of experience as mariners in those waters, it’d be stupid to not give them a place at the table.

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wrt the knee jerk reaction, it’s inevitable in this case that policy would be driven by simple-minded public outcry. In aviation there is public trust that after an incident there is a system in place that will take the appropriate action.

In maritime transportation of petroleum there is instead mistrust that the system will respond appropriately.

In this case perhaps the PPA took the companies at their word, that in the case of bad weather the tugs would break out of the notch and tow astern.

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Jake Shearer is not designed to intentionally come out of the notch to tow astern in rough weather.

It was designed by Entech Designs in Houma, LA (who designed similar tugs for Penn Maritime), and built by Conrad Shipyard in Morgan City, La. It was the second of three ATBs Conrad built for Harley. The first ATBs that Conrad has built.

In my opinion all they have is a half-assed emergency towing contingency set up that they never expected to use. Apparently, they were not able to use it when they needed it.

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The industry is taking a risk of a knee-jerk regulatory response when they move petroleum in unseaworthy boats.

In any case depending only upon Canadian regulations to keep the risks associated with marine transportation of oil at an appropriate level is a very inefficient approach.

Designed to meet Coast Guard regulations not to actually work.

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Sometimes I wonder why the oil companies don’t hire somebody like me to do their vetting. Then I realize that if I were vetting, I’d promptly be fired for being too honest and telling them things that they don’t want to hear.

If the oil companies demanded top quality equipment that was properly crewed, it would probably raise the price of gasoline at the pump by 1 cent per gallon.

Most of the medium to large tug and barge companies today are run by accountants and lawyers. No mariners in sight.

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And if they used proper tankers to do the same, how much would that add to the cost per Gl. at the pump??
Since they would be offering faster, safer and more reliable service, maybe not anything at all.

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There is a place in oil transportation for tankers of various sizes, ATBs, and conventional tugs and barges. It’s just a matter of using the proper high quality tool for the job at hand.

The people in the office got no skin in the game. The head of Harley Marine should do some jail time, that’d turn thing around quick.

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Harley is a lawyer without seagoing experience. He merely relied upon his naval architects, shipyard, pin manufacturer, ABS, USCG, SIRE auditors, insurance surveyors, etc. who all told him that the Jake Shearer was properly designed, and built, met all required standards, and was seaworthy and fit for the intended trade.

I’m not in favor of putting anyone in jail for an accident, but if I were, I’d start with the people who wrote the inadequate regulations. Next those who designed to only meet the bare minimum regulations that they ought to know are inadequate.

It looks like the Nathan Stewart accident virtually wiped out Kiby’s large and profitable West Coast division. That’s an enormous penalty.

I wonder what role the Jake Shearer incident had in Harley’s loss of three major contracts to Vane? Maybe Harley is paying a big penalty too?

I understand when small struggling companies take big risks to save small sums. They often don’t know any better, and don’t have much choice. I don’t understand when large well funded companies take on huge risks to save a few pennies.

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Except for ATBs I completely agree. I started out working oil barges between Seattle and Skagway and all points between with a wire boat. At the same time there were Canadian coastal tankers plying the same waters and spills were very few and far between.
I see this as a political issue that except for banning what should have been banned long ago as a criminally rule busting ATB/ITB scam I simply do not see an issue. It is fair enough to limit the size of tankers running the inside, it is no place for large crude carriers and going offshore would be faster anyway.

The title of this thread is an insult to mariners and the industry, it is nothing more than fear mongering clickbait.

I think this thread title came from some new age treehugger’s article that was published elsewhere. I agree that the treehugger’s article is ill-informed nonsense and an insult to mariners, but I don’t have a problem with the title being used here in such a mocking way.

If a an ATB consists of a real fully equipped tugboat and barge set up to be towed on the wire, and it has a large capable crew experienced in towing, I don’t have a problem with that.

If it is designed and intended never to tow except in an emergency, in other words it’s a make-believe tugboat, then no. That should not be allowed.

If an ATB is just a tanker with a propulsion system and wheelhouse attached by a hinge, then no. That should be treated as a tanker. It should not be allowed to be operated as if it were a tug and barge.

I think that there should be some practical limit on the size of oil carrying ATBs and the routes that they can operate on. If we can require tankers to have double hulls, we could also require them to have fully attached enginerooms.

I would like to see more small ATBs, it’s a good technology for some applications, provided that they are fully capable of towing on the wire.

The article does not insult mariners, in fact the opposite.

As the crew dealt with their numerous emergencies, the loaded fuel barge drifted out of control straight towards the Gosling Rocks, -a formidable set of reefs that extend southwards from the Goose Islands group into Hecate Strait.

Eventually the crew of the Jake Shearer turned to the problem of its drifting barge. They endeavoured to nudge the barge away from its steady trajectory towards the rocks. This is a dangerous maneuver

Eventually after a long struggle, two courageous crew were able to leap from the heaving decks of the Jake Shearer to the barge, and from there deploy an anchor, and finally, the Zidell Marine 277 fetched up and held about a stones throw from the Gosling Roctks.

I didn’t see these details in earlier reporting.

I changed the title, added the authors name.

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I think the words “scurge” and “prowl” are probably what raise ire.