Not easy to be a Southampton pilot these days ... MAIB report

[spotti]

The MAIB's Investigation Report on VALLERMOSA's "contact" with BW ORINOCO and NAVION FENNIA at Fawley 25 February 2009 has just been published.
Interesting reading, - and quite surprising that lousy paper work can cause such problems. The VALLERMOSA was - during berthing manoeuvering procedures close to the terminal - denied berth access due to the use of a wrong declaration form.
What's next?

More on www.maib.gov.uk

Regards
Niels

[John Jones]

Niels,
Yes it would seem that pilots are subject to bureaucracy hampering with the job in hand as much as most of us are in today's world. However following the MAIB's investigation it would appear that a little more commonsense will be used in future to prevent such a situation arising again...
"As a result of the accident, action has been taken by BP Oil UK to ensure berthing operations are not aborted for administrative reasons, and ABP Southampton has amended its procedures so as to prevent the late aborting of tankers calling at oil terminals, regardless of their size."
Regards
John J.

[Kelvin Davies]

I am not entirely surprised.
I recently overheard a conversation between the pilot on board a good sized tanker, inbound to BP Hamble, and the berthing officer at the terminal.
The man at BP was very helpful, arranging manifolds, wires & ropes etc.
Once it was decided what would be used, the berthing officer said to the pilot "I will talk to you again later when you are closer".
The reply, delivered in a snooty, brusque manner was "No you won't. I will be talking to VTS on channel 12 and don't expect any further communications from you"!
I remarked to a friend that, if I was the berthing officer, I would have gone for a cup of tea and kept quiet (as ordered) as the pilot struggled to park the tanker!
It is also interesting to listen to the berthing operations across the river at Fawley. It is amazing to hear the person in charge of mooring advising the pilot on board something like Front Shanghai that he needs to go ahead another 15cm!
Now that is precision parking!

[Fotojoe]

the officer of the watch cannot leave the bridge "for a cup of tea" as he is still in command of the vessel, and not the pilot.

[Kelvin Davies]

Not the OOW; it was the bloke on shore in charge of the berthing I was referring to.
The way the pilot spoke to him was a bit like a school teacher talking to a naughty kid.

[ChasB46]

Kelvin, I quite agree ..I heard the pilot's message and his attitude was **??!! rude when the berthing officer was trying to help him re mooring lines/ manifold positions etc.
MAIB said the "report" pilot was overloaded with info and had no assistance ...I can easily see why if they all adopt that ungrateful attitude.
If I was the berthing officer in future and it appeared the same pilot was approaching I would keep shtum , enjoy my tea break,and let him worry about mooring lines etc. when in the middle of the final manoeuvres.

[Tom Walker]

At the risk of opening a can of worms, I have to say that it is worrying to see so much 'radio' talk being quoted on a public site.  Many of us enjoy listening and arranging our days by the shore based on information gathered on the radio, but I feel we should respect what are largely confidential conversations, no matter what the rights or wrongs are of what is being said.

This of course is just my take on this issue,

Thank you

Best regards to all,

Tom

[Michael Meredith]

Having read this thread I am surprised at the tenor of the comments and the way in which operational conversations have been quoted. I have to agree with Tom Walker that this kind of reportage does no favours to the correspondents or to the site.

If you wish to listen to radio conversations please respect the privacy of them and certainly do not comment on them from a position of knowing little of what actually goes on when berthing a ship.

Michael Meredith

[ChasB46]

If you read the MAIB report on the Fawley incident of 25 February 2009 involving tanker berthing at Hamble it was a lack of co-operation between all parties that caused the pilot to be stressed on the final approach. Subsequently, here we had one of the parties involved, the berthing officer, endeavouring to be helpful only to be given short shrift. The comment I made was on the attitude not the conversation, which incidentally on Channel 12, is heard on an open channel to all the marine traffic in the VTS area, and in MHO was not a good advertisement for inter agency co-operation.

[Kelvin Davies]

Nobody is being an "armchair expert" and nobody is making "valued judgments" on the pilot's performance.
The pilot concerned was 30 minutes away from the berth and the person to whom he was being rude was the very person he was going to need when it came to pushing up to the berth.

[ChasB46]

Perhaps you need to read the report.

[John Jones]

MichaelTM wrote:
Having read this thread I am surprised at the tenor of the comments and the way in which operational conversations have been quoted. I have to agree with Tom Walker that this kind of reportage does no favours to the correspondents or to the site.

If you wish to listen to radio conversations please respect the privacy of them and certainly do not comment on them from a position of knowing little of what actually goes on when berthing a ship.

Michael Meredith

I think perhaps rather than having another internal argument on the site it might be worth taking note of Michael's comment quoted above. I'm sure none of us would like having every word we had said in a professional capacity being spread about the web and judged by people who may not be aware of the full story. These radio conversations are not intended for public broadcast or analysis. Perhaps we should respect that.
Regards
John J.

[Brian Cawkwell]

Jonesy wrote:
Quote:

MichaelTM wrote:
Having read this thread I am surprised at the tenor of the comments and the way in which operational conversations have been quoted. I have to agree with Tom Walker that this kind of reportage does no favours to the correspondents or to the site.

If you wish to listen to radio conversations please respect the privacy of them and certainly do not comment on them from a position of knowing little of what actually goes on when berthing a ship.

Michael Meredith

I think perhaps rather than having another internal argument on the site it might be worth taking note of Michael's comment quoted above. I'm sure none of us would like having every word we had said in a professional capacity being spread about the web and judged by people who may not be aware of the full story. These radio conversations are not intended for public broadcast or analysis. Perhaps we should respect that.
Regards
John J.

Is it against the law to listen to these conversations ?

Or

is it uninforceable ?

[Arnes]

Cawky,
It is not against the law to listen to conversations on VHF as long as you are licenced to this. In most countries you need a licence (or operator-certificate) to buy VHF-equipment legally, to get this you also have to sign a declaration of confidentality. This mean that you are not allowed to spread officially what you hear there. And I should think these rules apply for UK also.

Regards, Arnes

[Guest]

cawky wrote:
Is it against the law to listen to these conversations ?

Or

is it uninforceable ?

Hi Brian

In general terms - UK Law is that it is illegal to listen to any type of radio transmissions which are not intended for you.

In practice not enforced UNLESS there is a clearly evident misuse of information gathered from that transmission. The Law was introduced as a result of criminals using scanners to listen to Police transmissions.

I was quite surprised that Northumbria Police recently posted a message to this site asking for anyone who listened in on the arrival of the Drunken Tug Skipper (alleged) to get in touch with them. I had a thought that perhaps they were trying to boost their arrest figures with some shipspotters admitting they use scanners  :lol:

Regards