Hard over and sweeping the surface smooth: underway with another load from the Northville platform into the glow of a Long Island Sound sunset…..

How about chart weights and magnifiers? I always hate it when some thoughtless, inconsiderate idiot decides to come in the windward-side door to the pilothouse (especially when it’s me!), sending papers scattering all over the deck. I generally try to keep them firmly affixed to clip boards but they seem to multiply like the proverbial rabbits and there’s always at least a few (or more than a few) stray sheets here and there. Chart magnifiers serve double duty as both paper/chart weights and viewing aids to see small but important details more clearly.

Weems & Plath makes this classy, heavy brass-based 3″ diameter magnifier with a 5x power lens. It’s definitely old-school and, at three-quarters of a pound, you can easily bust a trash-talking deckhand upside the head from across the pilothouse with it as well. It’s available on Amazon.com for $35.99.

Landfall Navigation sells the 3″ diameter / 4x power UltraDome Magnifier from UltraOptix for $35.00 and, while not as old-school in appearance as the model above, it appears to be even more functional as a viewing device.

Celestaire sells the 2.5″ diameter / 4x power Magnabrite light gathering chart magnifier for $22.95, which comes in a protective velvet storage bag. Or…..

…..you can also get other sizes and products directly from Magnabrite, including this 3.5″ version with a wood base for $59.95. Major bonus points for Magnabrite for being made in the U.S.A., which is also very old-school these days.

Westbound at Execution Rocks, approaching the East River and Gotham, with another load of black oil for the tank farms of Con Hook…..

Sleep Apnea & the Professional Mariner

by Capt. Doug Pine

As a professional mariner you are, I’m sure, quite familiar with the sounds of snoring coming from the cabins aboard the vessels upon which you serve. Unfortunately, at times, we must share a cabin with a snoring shipmate. I remember a time over ten years ago when the assistant engineer and I shared a cabin when I was a mate on a tug for Sause Brothers in Hawai’i. One morning he went off on me at breakfast: “Doug, I can’t get a moment’s sleep when you’re in there! You snore louder than anyone I have ever heard!” This was no surprise, as I knew that I snored. My then-wife used to kick me in my sleep to get me to roll over and stop snoring. My brother and I were famous in our family for our snoring. Next time we were in port, I walked across Nimitz Highway to the K-Mart and bought some of those strips you paste on your schnozz that are “guaranteed to stop your snoring!” I bought some sprays, too. Nothing worked. I felt bad for my cabin-mate, and stayed awake as much as I could. The A/E bitched about it until I got on a different boat that fortunately had a private berth for the Mate.

When I married my wife Kathy, she said that I snored but she didn’t mind it. I thought (and still do, by the way) that I had to be the luckiest man alive to be with a woman like that. For the first five years of our marriage I snored away happily, with no middle-of-the-night kicks and no early-morning complaints from my bed partner. As time went by I, like many of my peers, began noticing the my health was slowly but surely deteriorating. I had quit smoking cigarettes in 1999 but I had developed hypertension (high blood pressure) and was obese, lazy, and pretty much sedentary.

Then, during a pre-employment physical in 2008, I learned that I had Type 2 diabetes. Like a bucket of cold water, it was. I began changing my eating habits, started exercising, and hoping for change. Not much changed really, except I did start losing some weight. I was always tired though. I would come home from work, sit down in my easy chair to watch the news, and would be fast asleep within minutes. When I would wake my family would laugh at me for snoring away loudly as I snoozed in my chair. I just didn’t have any energy after about 2:00pm each day. On the weekends I would mostly nap, trying to build up energy for the coming work week. At this time I was running the simulation department at PMI in Seattle, a demanding and time-consuming job that, counting my commute, kept me away from home each day for over twelve hours, and often more. I was a wreck. I thought I was depressed, so my doctor put me on anti-depressant medication. So here I was, in my mid-forties, taking four different prescription medications each day, poking my finger to test my blood sugar several times a day, and taking my blood pressure twice a day. In other words, I was the poster child for the American pharmaceutical industry’s mission statement. I was in good company, yet was not comforted by that fact. I hated taking the medicine, and being tied to testing each day. It is no small thing with the Coast Guard anymore, given the new medical standards they’ve implemented with NVIC 04-08. Beware, my shipmates, beware!

At a routine visit to my dentist one day I noticed a rack card that discussed snoring. It encouraged me to ask my dentist about possible treatment for snoring trouble, so I did. Asking that question eventually changed my life. My dentist told me that there are several treatment approaches available, but it all starts with a visit to an MD, a sleep specialist. Great, I thought, another doctor-to-doctor scam to generate income and commissions. But I like my dentist, and trusted him. It took several months, but eventually I decided to follow up.

I called the Tacoma Sleep Clinic and made an appointment. When I went in I thought it would be a quick in-and-out with a return visit to my dentist for an appliance fitting. What actually happened was I had about a one hour sit down with Dr. Daniel Clerc (pronounced: claire) who proceeded to tell me all I ever wanted to know about something called Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). He took a detailed medical history from me and looked inside my nose, ears and mouth. He took measurements of my various pieces and parts in there and said that, absent the results of a sleep study, he would just about guarantee that I had OSA. The most interesting moment for me that day was when he asked “Do you suffer from nightmares?” I replied that I did indeed, almost every night. “Hmm”, he said, “Interesting.”

Dr. Clerc urged me to schedule a sleep study on my way out of his office. He said it would probably save my life. That really piqued my curiosity. “Save my life?” I asked. His answer was to list for me, and give me a pamphlet that listed for me, many of the conditions that can be related to OSA. As I read through the list of deadly diseases, I occurred to me that I already had a few of them:

• Hypertension
• Diabetes
• Obesity
• Depression
• Fatigue

There are several more on that list, and all of them are killers.

Needless to say, I scheduled a sleep study. This involved going to a clinic in Tacoma to spend the night while being hooked up to about thirty different sensors that measured my brain function, respiration, temperature, eye movement, pulse, blood oxygen levels, leg muscle movement and a polygraph. Well, not the polygraph. But they might as well have done it since polygraphs measure most of the same stuff. My session would also be recorded on video and audio. The results of the study would be sent to a sleep specialist for interpretation and diagnosis. I tossed and turned a bit, not used to being wrapped in wires, and eventually fell asleep. I woke up the next morning, grumpy and tired, and headed for work. The clinic called back a week or so later and said that, based on my initial study, they wanted me to come in for another one, this time using a machine to assist my breathing.

So back I went. While he was hooking me up to the now-familiar sensors, the technician showed me the mask and machine I would be breathing from and said he would be controlling it from his lair. So I picked a sleep number (love those sleep number beds!), watched a little TV and, after bitching a bit about the mask, fell asleep. He woke me the next morning and sent me on my way. I had gone in on a Friday night so I headed for home on Maury Island. When I got home I decided to do some yard work. Heavy stuff, tree trimming, clearing and chipping. I worked for eight hours straight and then figured it was time for my afternoon nap. Here’s where everything went sideways for me: I went in, turned on the TV, reclined in my easy chair and expected to fall asleep in moments. I waited, and waited some more, for sleep. It eluded me. I drank a beer, thinking that would push me over the edge. No sleep. Not even a yawn. So I got up and went outside and did three more hours of yard work. I had more energy on that Saturday in July of 2008 than I’d had since I was a twenty-something surfer on Maui. Kathy was as amazed as I was.

First thing Monday I called Dr. Clerc’s office. Gimme one of those machines, now! But no, one must work within the system. Two weeks for the results, two more weeks to get a machine ordered and set up. The longest month of my life, knowing that the cure was out there but not being able to get it. I was miserable. Two weeks later, I got a call from Dr. Clerc’s office. They asked me to come in for a follow-up visit for the results of my sleep study. I went in shortly thereafter and Dr. Clerc told me that I did indeed have a whopper of a case of OSA, and they would be able to fix me up without surgery. This was right around the time that television reporter Tim Russert died suddenly, and I’d been wondering if he, too, suffered from OSA, and if it had killed him. I wouldn’t be surprised if it did.

Dr. Clerc prescribed my treatment: the machine I craved. A Continuous Positive Air Pressure (CPAP) machine. This little beauty blows pressurized air into your airway when you sleep, preventing the soft tissues from collapsing and obstructing (OSA, get it?) your airway and causing apneas, which are the times when you stop breathing at night and your brain eventually forces you awake just enough to draw a breath. It is these apneas that cause all the trouble. If you’re waking up a hundred times each night, to prevent yourself from suffocating to death, you simply cannot get any good sleep. Your body will, over time, suffer terribly. In other words, a fan can save your life.

The CPAP machine is small and quiet. I use a mask that fits into my nostrils, and doesn’t cover my mouth. It even has a humidifier built in. It’s portable, so I take it to work with me. It’s the easiest cure I’ve ever taken. I’ve been using CPAP for just over a year and, during that time, I’ve lost forty pounds. I’m not taking prescription medications anymore. None. My blood pressure is normal. My blood sugar is normal. I’m not depressed. My energy level is up. I exercise. At my last eye exam I read one line better than I’d ever done before. Oxygen is an essential element, and when you get enough of it your body responds in positive ways. What a concept. Most intriguing to me: I no longer have the nightmares. I used to wake screaming in the night from horrible nightmares, and they scared the heck out of my wife. The last one I had was one night when I didn’t use the machine. They’re gone.

I wanted to share this story with my fellow mariners, especially those whose employers still see fit to force them to work a six-on/six-off watch rotation. The two-watch system alone is a huge threat to a mariner’s health. Add sleep disorders to the mix and it becomes potentially deadly. Look around you at work. How many of your peers suffer from hypertension, diabetes and obesity? How many of your shipmates snore? How many live sedentary lives? How many have died within a year or two of retirement? We all know them. That was me not too long ago. My diagnosis of OSA, and the treatment with CPAP, has changed my life for the better, and more than likely has extended it by many years.

Many of us in the maritime industry, like it or not, are stuck in the two-watch system. We owe it to ourselves to maintain our health as best we can under these difficult work hours. Quit smoking if you haven’t. Switch to decaf. Drink lots of water, and try to get at least five hours of sleep during one of your off-watch periods. It’s a challenge, to say the least. I don’t believe that the two-watch system will disappear in my lifetime, so I’ve decided that, for me, it isn’t worth it. I won’t work another six-and-six boat unless I have to in order to feed my family. But I’m at a point in my career where I have the luxury of making that choice. If you can’t make that choice for yourself do everything you can to preserve your health so you’ll be around for your family for many years to come.

I did an interview with Dr. Clerc for this article, and his answers follow:

Doug: What do you estimate is the number of people in the United States with OSA?

Dr. Clerc: It is conservatively likely somewhere between 5 to 15% of the entire population, some estimates are higher (20%) = 15 to 60 million people).¹

Doug: Of these, how many have been diagnosed and treated?

Dr. Clerc: Possibly 10 to 15 percent.

Doug: What can be the long term impact on the health of those with untreated OSA?

Dr. Clerc: In terms a layman can understand: It can kill you.²

Doug: How does treatment of OSA impact the lives of those treated?

Dr. Clerc: From a clinical perspective there is very often a complete resolution of clinical complaints. The associated medical conditions are known to be improved: less cardiac problems, improved depression, improved diabetes control, decreased sleepiness, and a generalized improvement in cognitive function.

Doug: Is treatment complicated and difficult to comply with?

Dr. Clerc: The treatments can be divided into three broad groups: surgical, medical(CPAP), and dental (oral appliances). Adjunctive treatments include weight loss, elevation of the head of the bed, and maximizing treatment of conditions like nasal allergies and congestive heart failure. Compliance with treatments is largely dependent on the person rather than the approach to care. The treatment modality is predicated upon anatomy and the severity of the OSA. With guidance by a dedicated Board Certified Sleep Specialist who will chose the correct treatment and address problems that may arise related to the specific treatment modality…compliance is related more to innate personality traits than the mode of therapy being used.

Doug: Considering professional mariners, in particular those on six hour watches who regularly get only four to five hours of sleep per day, at times in one to two hour blocks, can CPAP treatment for OSA help mitigate fatigue?

Dr. Clerc: The general concept is that if you have OSA…you have it at all times and locations. It doesn’t matter when or where you are sleeping. The CPAP should be on during sleep, even if it’s a short nap.

Doug: What are the potential long term effects on the overall health of mariners working a six and six watch rotation?

Dr. Clerc: The immediate effects related to sleepiness and fatigue related to disruption of the normal circadian rhythms. This is often related to the development of mood disorders (depression/anxiety disorder), metabolic disorders (weight gain, diabetes), and cardiovascular problems (HTN). These problems can of course persist long after return to a normal sleep schedule, but can be diminished by a health conscious individual who exercises and has a good diet and lifestyle.

Doug: What are good sleep strategies for mariners working six hour watches?

Dr. Clerc: This is an area that has gotten increased attention over the years. The question is – what happens when the normal circadian cycle is disrupted? And, is there a way to maximize function when a traditional regimen of 8 hours sleep/16 hours of wakefulness is not possible? The navy has used an 18 hour schedule…6 on and 12 off with 3 rotating shifts. Much research has been done on this. The problems arise with the use of stimulants like caffeine to stay awake and alert….but then adversely impact the ability to sleep. The ideal position is to avoid stimulants for 12 hours before desired sleep. Make the sleep environment as dark, quiet, and comfortable as possible. With 6 on/6 off scheduling…many find it useful to choose one of the 6 off time periods as the major sleep period and they try to get the most sleep – 5 hours or more during that time period….and a shorter nap during the alternate time. Other obligations….hygiene and meals also eat into the time periods. Consistency is the most important approach. Avoidance of sedatives is important and is often prohibited in environments that involve the operation of equipment.

¹ Depending on the study and the criteria being used for diagnosis (the criteria have been modified over the years and the technology being used has advanced) it is conservatively likely somewhere between 5 to 15% of the entire population, some estimates are higher (20%) = 15 to 60 million people).

• Community Based Study 30-60 yrs old (random sample of 602 employed men and women)
• OSA defined as AHI > 5 = 9% women, 24% men
• OSA defined as AHI > 5, plus excessive daytime sleepiness = 2% women and 4% men

(Young T, Palta M, Dempsey J, Skatrud J, Weber S, Badr S., NEJM, 1993;328:1230)

Note the year of this study: 1993. The prevalence today is likely to be much higher.

1. Our society is growing more and more obese.
2. The equipment and techniques used to diagnose OSA are now far more sensitive.

• 35 – 50% of hypertension (HTN) patients have underlying sleep disordered breathing (SDB)
• >70% of drug resistant HTN patients have SDB
• Roughly 50% of patients with diabetes type 2 have underlying SDB
• 70% incidence of OSA in stroke patients
• 50% incidence of obstructive or central sleep apnea in congestive heart failure patients
• 40% incidence of SDB in coronary artery disease patients

²OSA is independently associated with:

• HTN
• Cardio-vascular disease (CAD, CHF)
• Cerebro-vascular accidents
• Daytime sleepiness & impaired cognitive function
• Motor-vehicle & job-related accidents
• Diminished quality of life.
• Insulin Resistance/Diabetes

(Young T, Peppard PE, Gottlieb DJ. Epidemiology of Obstructive Sleep Apnea: A population health perspective. Am J Resp Crit Care Med.2002;165:1217-39)

(Mohsenin V. Is sleep apnea a risk factor for stroke? A critical analysis. Minerva Med. 2004 Aug;95(4):291-305)

(Harsch IA, Hahn EG, Konturek PC. Insulin resistance and other metabolic aspects of the Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome. Med Sci Monit. 2005 Feb 25;11(3):RA70-75)

(Peker Y, Kraiczi H, Hedner J, Loth S, Johansson A, Bende M. An independent association between obstructive sleep apnea and coronary artery disease. Eur Respir J. 1999;13:179-184)

OSA is also associated with:

• Depression
• Anxiety disorder
• Substance abuse
• Memory impairment
• Sleep fragmentation & insomnia

Editor’s Note: this is the first contribution to the Towmasters Forum from MTVA member Doug Pine, and you’ll be seeing more quality writing from him in the future. You can check out his blog, The Dullest Catch, and read about his recent harrowing experiences as captain of a U.S.-flagged fishing vessel working in the South Pacific. Doug is now safely back home in Washington.

Eastbound at the Old St. Georges Bridge with a light one alongside, riding a fair current through the C&D Canal, and enjoying the last of the fine weather while summer waves goodbye……

GPS brownout? Holy deteriorating critical infrastructure, Batman! News flash, fellow mariners, perhaps those amazin’ satellites in the sky aren’t quite as infallible as we would like (desperately want) to believe. Maybe our slavish worship at the alter of GPS/LORAN/DECCA/OUIJIBOARDS/WHATEVER is a bit misplaced. Maybe we’ll all have to bloody well fend for ourselves (as many of us still do) relying primarily on radar, charts, our eyeballs, local knowledge and some seat-of-the-pants piloting like back in the day. Or maybe not. Maybe the techno-wizards will pull a rabbit out of their hats and keep the party rockin’ for a while longer. Perhaps we’ll just continue on as before, getting gradually more and more dependent on progressively more complex and mysterious technology which can erode our traditional skills and may or may not be there for us in our time of serious need.

This article by James Fallows in The Atlantic reveals the sordid state of affairs up in satellite space, and where we may be heading. Here we go again, into the void…..

Technology and how we relate to, use and abuse it is the in-your-face issue. But the deeper back story here is manning and fatigue: what it does to all of us in the transportation industry, and how we keep trying to get around it with more technology and gizmos. Mariners, aviators, truckers, railroad crews…..it gets all of us no matter what we do as long as minimizing crew sizes at all costs remains the prevailing religion, and no amount of technology can change the simple fact that we humans have physiological limits, and we’ve been seriously pushing, ignoring and exceeding those limits for quite a while now in an often counterproductive attempt to squeeze every last drop of operational efficiency/profit out of our system. Pilots spacing out and flying right past the airport? Yup. Fatigued pilots making fatal mistakes and killing everyone on the plane in Buffalo? You bet. Don’t forget the day in 2002 that the I-40 Bridge in Webbers Falls, OK was knocked into the Arkansas River by a seriously over-tired towboat captain who passed out at the sticks (helm), causing the deaths of 14 people. The NTSB had a smoking gun but punted big-time on that one, with a wishy-washy finding of a previously-undetected heart  murmur as the probable proximate cause of his loss of consciousness. They, and the Coast Guard, essentially ignored the stark fact that the man had a major crew change-related sleep deficit of between 10 and 11-1/2 hours in the 72 hours prior to the allision. But I’m sure that the NTSB’s finding that it played no role on that tragic morning was correct. Right…..and how this affected his overall health (short-term and long-term) and fitness for duty never seemed to enter the discussion either, but it should have.

Regardless, it has been and will continue to be a complex issue with far-reaching economic consequences. Even the transportation safety and regulatory agencies seem conflicted or confused as to what their role should be, usually shying away from the bigger issues rather than showing political courage and leadership. When a conscientious aviation inspector tried to do his duty he got punished for it by his own agency. When a diligent marine surveyor, serving as an AWO Responsible Carrier Program auditor, tried to document the many serious deficiencies aboard vessels operated by DRD Towing (remember the T/V Mel Oliver?) so that they might be corrected he, too, was removed from his duties and replaced with a more “cooperative” auditor (who still, ultimately, flunked DRD). A shipyard designs, builds and proudly advertises a new 74-foot HandySize Series tugboat (2,800 to 3,200hp) specifically created to take advantage of regulatory loopholes that allow, among other things, “optimized” crew sizes (optimized for whom?) of just two mariners, which is inherently unsafe, and minimal professional qualifications. The list goes on and on. Here’s the deal: you can move stuff/people for the lowest possible cost-per-mile, or with a reasonably high level of safety, but you can’t have it both ways at the same time, no matter how much we might all wish it otherwise. The Colgan Air crew that lost control of their aircraft while on final approach into Buffalo was, literally, set up to fail long before they ever touched the flight controls. Interesting how the regulators wouldn’t or couldn’t bring themselves to even attempt to tackle such an obvious and important issue for aviators, and the rest of us, as commuting to work and how it affects our ability to be rested enough to do our jobs safely. That transportation workers should show up for duty rested and able to perform the duties required of us so that we don’t endanger the public, ourselves, the transportation infrastructure and the environment sure sounds reasonable, but apparently it’s just not practically or economically feasible…..or so we’re told. People’s attitudes must change. That is the primary obstacle to a safer transportation system.

Way-big Towmasters mahalo to Kennebec Captain, fellow working mariner and kindred spirit of the blogosphere for the original hot tip on the Atlantic article.

Not as old school as brass dividers and parallel rules, rolling parallel plotters have still been around for my entire seagoing career and are worth consideration. Weems & Plath offer four versions and the first two are included only as a comparison to the latter three, which are truly commercial-grade navigation instruments.

The 3.5″ x 12.5″ rolling plotter…..

and the 2″ x 8″ compact rolling plotter…..

…..may be useful to someone jammed into the cramped pilothouse of a very small vessel, but to me they’re way too lightweight and prone to slippage. The larger one was standard issue to all Coast Guard small boat coxswains of my era and I remember well the frustration of trying to use one while bouncing around in the old 41-foot UTB’s. Not very productive, to say the least. I would occasionally use them, very carefully, on top of the large chart table in the radio watchstander’s room in the station house and managed to get decent accuracy out of them. But I never really trusted them much and preferred the heavier parallel rules.

Then there are the 2-5/8″ x 13-7/8″ Bi-Rola Rule combination plotter…..

and the larger, heavier P.R. 500 rolling plotter, which weighs in at a hefty 1 pound, 10 oz. and measures 3-5/8″ x 19-5/8″.

Finally, we have the Admiralty brass rolling plotter from England. 18″ long and made of solid brass and stainless steel, it is said to be tested to roll true to within 1mm over a distance of 2 meters and is the heavyweight champion.

If you’re going to bother to have a rolling plotter, one of these are what you want. The two Bi-rola rules roll on either a fore-and-aft or side-to-side axis and are way heavier than the others with their knurled brass wheels, making them significantly less prone to slipping or being knocked off course by a crease in the chart. Much more user-friendly on the typical chart table. Landfall Navigation has them for $69.99 and $112.99, respectively. The Admiralty brass rolling plotter costs $259.95 from us.binnacle.com. Any of these may seem way too expensive to many of you, but there is another way to look at it. I bought the smaller Bi-rola combination rolling plotter back when I earned very little money ($132.00 a day) as a tug deckineer on a creaky old canal boat back in 1990. Years later I used it to pass the navigation/plotting modules of the 1,600 GRT mate and master tests given at the Coast Guard REC in New York, which required grades of at least 90% to pass. They didn’t, and still don’t, give you any do-overs on the spot if you screw it up. You had to come back on another day and try it again. Accuracy has always been very important when the answer to each question is built upon the answers to the previous questions, and any plotting errors made early on will cascade through the rest of your answers, causing you to go down in flames. Just one missed day’s pay as a licensed mate could easily pay for a whole set of top-of-the-line navigation plotting tools with enough left over for a celebratory dinner and some good beer. Now how much are solid, accurate plotting tools worth to you?

They also see occasional real-world use for laying down permanent course tracklines on our print-on-demand charts and still reside today in a chart table drawer aboard the tug I work on. Whenever I need them for navigating or voyage planning they perform well and yield trustworthy, confidence-inspiring results. What more do you want?

Meet Penn Maritime’s Penn No. 6, a very rugged-looking boat that clearly exudes the no-nonsense attitude of a big, powerful seagoing tug. It positively reeks of old-school.

No, it’s not just another pretty face. This is the place where, when pushing, kinetic force is transferred from one hull to another, all 5,700 hp of it. The barge moves and the cargo gets delivered. When towing outside this is where the seas are taken, literally, on the chin.

The Oakland Raiders paint job and big gobs of rubber say bad-ass all the way. Built in 1970 by the Southern Shipbuilding Co. in Slidell, LA. as the Robert Alario, the No. 6 is 149 feet long, with a relatively svelte beam of just 35 feet, and carries 130,000 gallons of diesel fuel which allows for long-range, trans-ocean towing capabilities.

Here’s some more potentially good news on the sometimes serious mariner access problems that we’ve all experienced at various terminals and facilities when trying to change out crews, go grub shopping or just take a simple walk for exercise. Coast Guard Rear Admiral Kevin Cook, Director of Prevention Policy, released this ALCOAST (CG-wide) message on October 2nd that clearly states that the Coast Guard recognizes that there is still a problem and that it needs fixing. We’re into the thick of the 5-year renewal period for the original versions of the Facility Security Plans  (FSP’s) that were mandated in the Maritime Transportation Security Act, and this is where the big opening exists to rectify some of the abuses that have occurred. Paragraph 2 of the ALCOAST reads:

"THERE ARE STEPS THAT COTPS SHOULD CONSIDER IMMEDIATELY TO
FACILITATE SEAFARER ACCESS BEYOND WHAT IS CURRENTLY BEING DONE AND
PREVIOUSLY RECOMMENDED IN REFERENCE E. SPECIFICALLY, WITH THE FIVE-
YEAR REVIEW PROCESS FOR FACILITY SECURITY PLANS (FSP) UNDERWAY,
THERE IS AN OPPORTUNITY WITH THE APPROVAL PROCESS TO ENSURE THE
REQUIREMENT OUTLINED IN REGULATION FOR COORDINATION OF SEAFARER
ACCESS IS CLEARLY DEFINED WITHIN THE FSP. COTPS SHOULD CONFIRM
THAT EVERY FSP SUBMITTED FOR REVIEW SPECIFICALLY DESCRIBES HOW
COORDINATION OF CREW CHANGE OUTS, SHORE LEAVE AND VISITS TO THE
VESSELS BY UNION AND WELFARE ORGANIZATION REPRESENTATIVES WILL BE
ACCOMPLISHED BY THE FACILITY IN ACCORDANCE WITH 33 CFR 105.200(B)"

It is imperative that any and all mariners who have experienced problems at particular terminals convey this information directly to the Coast Guard Captain of the Port (COTP) or Officer in Charge Marine Inspection (OCMI) , who are often one and the same, that has jurisdiction over the facility. It is they who will ultimately approve or disapprove the individual FSP’s. If you’re not sure what office has jurisdiction you can look up the geographic boundaries of all of the different COTP zones in 33 CFR – Part 3, and click here for a phone directory of each office. If you’re a member of a labor union you might want to check with them first to see if they’re coordinating a larger group effort to report access problems. Either way, it will carry much more weight if you carefully document your particular access problems with the dates, times and locations where they occurred, and what exactly happened. Then provide that detailed information to the Coast Guard. Generalized complaints of the “this shit sucks” variety are not likely to be taken very seriously by anyone. You either have all your ducks lined up or you don’t, and the Coast Guard is kinda’ busy, so get on with it.

Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen followed up the ALCOAST with this post nine days later on his iCommandant blog, which also includes a guest post by RADML Cook. Check it out…..and remember, don’t wait for someone else to do this for you. It is incumbent on each individual mariner to report these problems now and in the immediate future, while the opportunity exists to fix the problem. So speak up now or stop with the pissing, moaning and bitching.

This post begins a series that will periodically focus on older, or just plain old, practices, technologies and equipment that still have functionality and usefulness in the present-day work environment. The subject du jour is paper charts and, more specifically, the tools we use to plot (plot?) on them. Yes, believe it or not, you might actually want (or need) to do that every now and again should the electronic gizmos fail. You may well find yourself in the position of having to physically plot a course, fix your position, calculate safe distances, figure out eta’s, etc. Wouldn’t it be nice to have quality tools with which to work?

We’ll start with the “latest” in old technology; the pencil compass. Over the years I’ve occasionally seen them in the wheelhouses of various vessels. Usually they are cheap crap, like what we “old folks” used in grade school back in the day. But Weems & Plath has now brought out the heavy artillery, the German-made Professional Brass Pencil Compass.

As you can plainly see, this is old-school done right: 8 inches of heavy solid brass with a stainless steel point and a large knurled knob for clamping the pencil securely in place. There’s no screwing around with those tiny “leads”, and it’ll swing up to a 24-inch circle. The angle of the pencil is adjustable, as well as its length. What the hell do you do with one? You can use it to plot a fix using three or more radar ranges while in coastal navigation. For voyage planning you can use it to mark off safe-distance ranges from various navigational aids or known hazards on a nautical chart. It could also serve as a leather punch or would be handy for piercing little cubes of cheese and fruit while enjoying a snack on the mid-watch. If the need arose it could work beautifully as a stabbing weapon while you’re engaged in desperate, hand-to-hand combat with boarding parties of Somali pirates. The uses are practically endless! It lists for $57.99 from W&P, but you can get it for just $46.99 at Landfall Navigation in Stamford, Ct.

Next up are dividers. You can get either straight leg…..

or one-hand versions…..

…..in 7 or 8-inch lengths. They’re made of polished brass with stainless steel points. Landfall has the straight patterns for $27.99 and $33.99 and the one-hand types for $37.99 and $40.99. They are heavy-duty. They exude quality when held in hand. They are built to be well used and to last. There’s a lot to be said for those qualities in our stupendously wasteful, throw-away society.

Now it’s time for parallel rules, and forget about aluminum arms: you want brass whenever it’s available for the weight and steadiness it brings. Weems & Plath still makes them in a 15-inch length, which is generally the most useful size on a cramped chart table.

If you need a larger size then aluminum-legged it must be, but at the 24-inch length the overall weight is inherently greater so knocking them out of alignment as you walk them is somewhat less of a problem than with the smaller sizes.

Landfall has them both for $35.99 and $38.99 respectively.

Functional though the large, aluminum-legged version may be, brass still has way more class. Taking into account the different shapes of the arms, it’s also far more elegant for the discriminating navigator. Maybe that’s why Weems also offers the Elegant Navigation Set. It come’s with the 8-inch one-hand dividers, the 15-inch brass parallel rules and a small brass compass that you can use as a paperweight on the chart table, all fitted neatly into a varnished wooden box with brass hardware. That’s as old-school as it gets and you can get it for $109.99 at Landfall.

Finally, I’ll throw in ye olde Nautical Slide Rule for good measure.

It’s been around for as long as I can remember, in what appears to be an unchanged state, and is as simple, timeless and foolproof a navigation tool as humans have ever been able to devise. Well, maybe fool-resistant might be a better term to use. Anyway, it’s yours for $19.99 from Landfall and it’s worth every penny. Kennebec Captain made a fine post about it back in January with Nautical Slide Rule – More Than Meets the Eye. This is required reading for the thinking mariner…..and those that should be thinking but aren’t.