Why is everybody blaming KP and Buono and nobody is saying anything about MLL? This happened on their watch, their ship, their employee in command. They know what ship it was on. They know the name of everybody involved. So does whichever union mans the ship. Not a peep from either of them.
But sure let’s rail some more on KP.
KP did right be me and my family. It wasn’t given to us, was very hard work. I will not “Rail” on them nor any other maritime academys. I respect them all. I don’t know what union is involved with that particular ship, My son sailed MSC and Maersk. No major problems. But I can assure you Paul Doell, president of AMO, will do some house cleaning if it is one of their ships after a thorough investigation… Most straight up union guy I ever had to deal with over the last 25 years. This latest debacle is troubling, but as you state, many other parties are involved for “Non Action”.
This is an infuriating account of a horrible crime.
How unfortunate that she did not immediately email KP, the USCG, the FBI, and report it to the Master, and Maersk. Of course she should have informed the police in the next port. She also should have gotten off the ship in the next port to obtain treatment.
I think most Masters would have done about an hour of investigating, and then locked the 1st in his room until the next port. Of course, every Master would immediately report rape allegations to the office and the USCG.
She should have saved the bloody sheets that undoubtedly also had the 1st AE’s DNA on them. This would have been a fairly easy to prove rape case. The 1st would undoubted claim consent, but that would have been vitiated by her intoxication and lack of capacity to consent. Members of the crew that witnessed the drinking and perhaps other aspects of this crime would have wilted like a cheap suit under questioning by the USCG and FBI. They would not have been able to protect the 1st AE, even if they were initially inclined to. My guess is that the 1sr probably bragged about this to his buddies. It’s really too bad that she let this criminal escape justice.
She needs to stop blogging and get herself a high profile women’s rights lawyer to help her pursue appropriate criminal and civil actions.
Its not too later report the crime, especially if she still has the sheets. Even without the sheets, she needs to report this crime to the authorities, and enable them to do what they can about it. They will investigate and still may be able to make a viable case out of it.
The other KP women who were raped need to do the same things.
Obviously, KP needs to train its students about how to practice risk management and protect themselves from being raped on a ship. And what to do if they are raped on a ship.
As horrible as this is, it is not a reason to cancel sea year.
Hit port, low tolerance, get wasted!
I just read the New York case you posted. Great story! He quaffed 2 more…
On topic, there’s a big damn difference between sexual harassment and sexual assault. The academies have this military, rite of passage, hazing off the record undertone plus the junior person in any industy takes a little flack from the experienced. A bad combo for young female with seatime for license being held over her head.
Not unlike many businesses around the country or countries. And yes, a big difference between assualt and harassment. The lines can get quite thin on the latter, no matter what gender.
Sexual assault is real and happens every day. It is truly disgusting how certain people enable this behavior to continue.
However, on occasion, you get this: A Rape on Campus - Wikipedia
It really is sad, because every false accusation hurts true rape victims.
That is the point I was debating with you 2 days ago. If this had happened on a Transocean or Nobal Drilling ship or at an OSV company I’m 100% confident the title of the thread would have the name of the company in it & many posters on here would be livid at the drilling & oil & gas segment of the US maritime industry. Several frequent commenters on gCaptain made more fuss & were more aggressive against oil & gas companies when mariners reported being seasick during a hurricane than against a bluewater shipping company with a misogynist rape culture. I don’t know if it is like that because of nostalgia of US shiping or the mentality of “union brotherhood” but it completely fucked up.
If I’m the OICEW & someone repeats “I’ve been raped” several times to me over the phone they don’t have to report it because I will. I’m calling the OICNW, C/E & probably sending an email to the master’s email account to CMA. What type of warped Mickey Mouse show were they running & why do the academies continue to send female cadets to those ships. Find a company that hasn’t had a reported case of sexual harrassment in 10 yrs that has women & minorities in senior positions & send the females & minority cadets there. If those misogynists bastards ain’t cleaned up there act by now they probably never will & the collateral damage trying ain’t worth it.
This account is horrifying…but not surprising. This kind of shit happens all over this industry, it is rampant with dysfunctional individuals. NOAA had a scandal on an FSV a few years back resulting in the removal (as in feds were fired) of several permanent crew and the reassignment of the Master and Chief Mate (both NOAA corps officers). I had to go back to that ship a few times as a relief engineer. Every time I returned there were new stories awaiting.
The 1A/E in the story sounds like the 1A/E this FSV had in that he was also a misogynistic pig. He was part of the cohort who was ultimately given the boot. I had not heard of any rape or inappropriate touching from this guy, but he said a lot of similar boilerplate woman hating cave man bullshit to the young women thirds there at the time. I being in my 50’s would not have tolerated it, he would have been ignored or given a cursory spit take but that comes with many many years of dealing with other people’s shit…I don’t expect a young person without the experience of dealing with rampant assholery to be able to manage it. It is a constant stress even under the best of conditions.
We had another engineer who somehow stored child porn on the SAMM server…so not only do we have sick fuckers, we have dumb ones too…you can google it and find the article btw.
I am so glad I decided for health reasons to hang it up a little early and peace the fuck out. Chuck dem deuces.
Ships are isolated. They are out of the public view. No one cares about ships or knows their value to society. It’s become one of the last refuges for rapists, bullies, misogynists, racists and anti-socials. I’m sorry but not surprised to hear this happened.
This isn’t a KP issue or even an academy issue. It’s not a hawsepiper issue, or an officer or crew issue. It’s the last gasp of a time-gone-by.
We still tolerate (and encourage) whore mongering overseas. We are good husbands and fathers at home and worse than collage frat boys in foreign ports. We encourage over-intoxication in port. These behaviors are part of the culture. The culture has been changing but they haven’t changed as fast as the times.
The only way to change things is not be it. It’s to not smile and wink when you see it. It’s going to take the death and retirement of the old-timers because this is just the way it’s been.
Mamas, don’t let your daughters grow up to be sailors.
Blunt. Not untrue. Here’s blunt. I have a male cadet on one side of me and a female cadet on the other side of me. They both f’ed something up. They were both welcomed to the crew equally. I say to the male cadet… what’s your major malfunction? You f’ed up. Go fix it before we are really f’ed guy… I say to the female cadet… So, we have a small situation, let’s re-group as a team and try to remedy the situation… Technically, that’s sexual harassment on my part.
I agree that the culture on ships needs to change and I have seen evidence of it changing.
But saying the behavior of mariners is part of the culture is a stretch. The land based culture has their own problems. In my experience the maintaining of “normal” behavior is a geographical thing unless it becomes a money thing. Combine the two and behavior goes out the window. The further away people get from their home the more likely they are to engage in practices they would never do at home. I’ve seen some weird behavior among deacons from Miami, to Myrtle and Virginia Beach. Think Las Vegas or many other tourist locations.On a regular basis the married Wall St boys cavort in a manner that would make a sailor look like a Buddhist monk, this I have witnessed.
Don’t be too hard on sailors. I think we do pretty well. After all, those convention attendees in Las Vegas, Miami, London, Amsterdam etc., along with the Wall St boys and girls aren’t at sea for months on end.
Social media and the access is one of the culprits in today’s society. It is easier to meet people of the opposite sex, to locate certain areas, to book certain things. I give credit to today’s generation that is able to meanuever all of this in a civil manner, because I am sure most of us on here, if we had this access when we were young and growing up, oh my.
I disagree - when KP had problems in the past - the State schools changed their schedules to take advantage of the lack of KP
cadets.
Really? When and how? I have been pretty familiar with all of the academies for over 20 years and have not seen any significant changes.
Some of years ago during the Obama admin. A change in Marad. The upshot was closing of sea year and
each company that carried cadets had to go through an investigation to determine if the vessels and the companies were
ok with taking KP cadets. At the time, KP increased the number on MSC ships and others. I remember that some cadets who
did not get their time in had to go to sea after graduation to get their 300 days in. The time may be wrong but this
did happen.
Now if you are a new company, you have to be approved to carry cadets - no like in the old days (in the 60’s) when every US flag
vessel which was subsidized had to carry cadets.
You said the state academies changed. How did the state academies change? They were still getting their sea time during summer and holiday breaks. They did not change their academic schedules so as to get sea time on commercial ships at other times of the year in the absence of USMMA midshipmen.
They have to get the sea time in order to graduate. But I get the gist, they could not graduate with their classmates.
Here are my editorial on the subject.
That wasn’t my experience at all and the company I work for is greedy for cadets. My friends that are faculty at one of the state schools also made no mention of it in my talks with them about cadets. Which academies changed up their schedules?