#deck officer

[pedroam-bang]

Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

[designpatternpirate]

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Don’t Turn Around, uh oh!

[messyspacespades]

Am I the only one that noticed this in the New Season 7 Trailer for The Clone Wars??

These Clone Deck Officers are wearing the SAME CLOTHING that the IMPERAL DECK OFFICERS DO.

Look what the bottom picture and a picture of the Imperal Deck Officer look like side by side:

YOU CANNOT TELL ME THEY LOOK ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME. 

Dave Filoni you’re a brilliant bastard. You also scare me.

[hellsbellsellesbelles]

Who would’ve thought a conversation with someone I had just met and would never meet again at 10 years of would spark a dream. I’ve wanted to be a Merchant Navy Deck Officer since 2005, and now it’s official. After 10 years of dreaming, followed my 3 and a half years of studying, and training at sea all worth it to receive this in the post this morning! I’ve visited 80 ports in 30 different country, met thousands of people from around the world, and made some amazing friends for life! I’ve grown in confidence, and as a person and I am ready to take on the world!

[hellsbellsellesbelles]

December – January

Caribbean season

So that’s that, I’ve not long got home from the most amazing venture in my life. I am completely heartbroken to have said goodbye to Wind Surf, and once again extend my thanks to everyone on board, each one taught me something. I really did not want to leave, the crew, the ship, and the Caribbean as England is too cold. What’s that I hear you ask, what was it like spending 5 weeks in the Caribbean around Christmas? Well, I’ll tell you, hot.

We arrived at Philipsburg, St. Maaten at the start of December, having stopped off in St. John’s, Antigua to dispose of garbage, pick up some embarking crew, and such. I returned to being on 4-8 full time, however this time with 2/O Sebastian, however after my first week, Alistair disembarked, leaving me as the only deck cadet on board, so did work with each of the navigating officers, if and when required.

I know I mentioned in my post about the med that the days were repetitive, but that was nothing compared to the Caribbean, as we anchored most days, and our arrival and departures we’re mostly the same time each day, not to mention that we visited the same ports, either weekly or every other week. This meant I did find myself getting more tired then what I was in Europe, and lead a less adventurous life, but that does no way mean I wasn’t finding myself feeling amazing about my training.

During watches my 2/O took a step back and it became more like him shadowing me as to oppose to me shadowing him. He was very reassuring that he was there if I had any uncertainties, to ask away, but soon I’ll be qualified and need to be confident having the con, so good to have some practice with someone there. Throughout watches he’d also ask me question such as what action I think we should take when we sighted other vessels, reinforcing my rules of the road practically. Along with often leaving the pre-arrival/pre-departure checks down to me, though doesn’t seem like much, it worked wonders for me feeling confident about being a future officer.

With work being done on the sails infrastructure during wet and dry dock, and Sebastian’s duo-ticket, the maintenance we did on sails was different to what was done with Aline. My last few weeks on sails were spent concentrating on the workings of the system and trying to restore them to a near original condition.

During the Caribbean season I became more aware of other operations that happened around the vessel, each cruise the chief officer, invited me to host tables with him in the guest dining room, I had time and energy to attend the on Deck BBQs & Line Dancing, beach BBQs, I spent a lot of time at the Marina, and I also managed to watch the crew show. I even sang Christmas carols on Christmas eve to our guests, and spent my New Year’s Eve interacting with guests in the Compass Rose bar.

By this time this had come around I was very used to interacting with guests, giving them tours of the bridge, answering any questions, but hosting tables was something different, every time I felt terrified (normally only for the first 10 minutes or so), I really didn’t want to say the wrong with, or worse spill food on my formal whites! Luckily, I got on very well with my chief officer, so my mind was put at rest, and it was very easy to continue a conversation. I genuinely think working with him helped me grow a lot on board, hearing “Lee, you are the best,” (Lee was his name for me, don’t ask I’m not entirely sure why either) multiple times a day was great, I must say.

My first holiday season at sea was one that I won’t forget definitely! As you probably all know I’m not the biggest party animal in the world, which meant I was dreading the Christmas Eve party, instead I spent my evening with some my closest friend I had made listening to musical and having a good laugh in my cabin. Christmas Eve also consisted of buy Christmas crackers, lots of candy, and somehow Waitrose products in Antigua.

Christmas day was definitely one that I don’t think I’ll experience again, due to the fact we spent the day at sea traveling north west, we had the perfect wind for sailing, meaning we turned the engines off around 10am and didn’t turn them on till about 20pm, this was wonderful for me, as my cabin was above the PMs, it was completely silent, ergo I woke up for morning and evening wake, to exchange secret Santa present on the bridge, and have the traditional Christmas burrito lunch, and slept pretty much the rest of the day.

We sailed into the New Year also, but I was not in bed at midnight to make the most of the silent engines. Every New Year people in my village in North West England go for a swim in the sea, this year I decided to uphold this tradition, although I was in Antigua. Though this wasn’t anything out the ordinary as I spent spent the time at the marina, most days swimming, and using the water trampoline, but I also discovered in Roseau, Dominica that I am ace at Stand Up Paddle Boarding, however not that great at doing flips anymore.

DCIM101GOPRO

DCIM101GOPRO

I am aware that there is so so so much more things I can write about, but if I wrote everything I wanted to, a) this would be thousands of words long, and b) I need to keep something back so I can have stories to tell that no one has heard before, so I’ve tried to keep it short and sweet.

I really want to say thank you again to everyone on board, the perfect team. Everybody on board taught me something, and I have made some fantastic friends that I hope I do stay in contact with. I feel completely privileged to work with who I have, if I mention one person I’d have to mention everyone, or at least 95% of the crew. When I said I didn’t want to leave I was completely telling the truth. I’m currently sat at home, feeling homesick (for probably the first time ever) for the ship I called home for the past four months, and the people I’ve called family. A wise woman did tell me though, “It’s never goodbye, just see you later.”

All good things must come to an end – See You Later Windsurf December – January Caribbean season So that’s that, I’ve not long got home from the most amazing venture in my life.

[hellsbellsellesbelles]

Dry & Wet Dock / Atlantic Crossing

November – December

Man, I regret hoping for a more eventful dry dock in my last post! Every day was busy, I was tired, I ended up very sweaty every day, I got stressed, I loved it, maybe not at the time (or at least most of the time), but looking back I know I enjoyed  the work, and I really appreciate the responsibilities that I was given. Though next time I’m not wearing a radio every day, I won’t make myself as easily available for jobs. The idea of day work also threw my body a bit, after weeks of f4 and 8s, working from 0730 through to 2015, with lunch & dinner breaks did take a few days to get used to. I’m not really sure what to write about dry dock, yes I was busy every day, but most days it was the same thing.

My main role during dry dock, and partially during wet dock was ‘Fire Guard Cadet’ along with GSM Anthony ‘Fire Guard Supervisor’, we assigned pairs, originally known as fire guards but later Fireflies, to a hot work, and check on them throughout the day, refilled their bottles if needed, etc. Each day we must have walked miles just making rounds of the ship. Some days there were more hot work locations then teams, which meant I stepped up to the role of fire guard.

The best days in Dry dock were the days that I was allowed to go into the dock itself. The first I tagged along with 2/O Aline within a few days of arriving, second with most of the crew, mid-way through the two weeks, and finally a couple of days before we left, I was tasked on supervising a contractor doing some work on the echo sounder anodes. It was really seeing how the ship looked during the whole time, before and after, in comparison to embarking late in to dry dock like on Commodore Goodwill.

Other tasks I was involved in during the two weeks included assisting in the preparation of Permits to Work, being first response for fire alarms, working with the ETO, being outside of tank entries in case of emergency and continuing maintenance of firefighting equipment, and sail system.

Every couple of nights we did make sure we had a break from long, loud days and had what became known as ‘family night’, which sometimes meant going for a meal, or to the nearby super store (which sold Irn-Bru), but mostly consisted of getting a take away and watching an animated film, usually Disney or penguin related.

Wet dock was a complete different work schedule, paired with the constant clock changes (retarding an hour every few days), my body clock did feel a wee bit out of whack. During our two weeks crossing I was on watch on the bridge between 0400 and 0800, though I prepped the days permits to work, so often didn’t leave the bridge till 0830ish, then 0845-0900 I would join the sailors in working around the ship, finishing just after 1500 each day. The reason for this was that both the other deck cadet, Alistair, and I could both do a navigational watch in which the sun was rising or setting, in order to practice our celestial navigation, along with completely practical maintenance tasks.

Each morning I would estimate a position for civil twilight (basically when you can see the horizon and stars) that day position using a previous and distance = speed x times. I would then find an estimation of where in the sky recognisable stars would be at that time. When said time comes around I’d use a sextant and azimuth ring to find the bearing and amplitude of the stars, of which I used to plot the ships position on the chart.

My first few days I was completely useless, my 2/O, Aline, had to guide me step by step through the whole procedure, and to begin with even shoot the stars for me. My first position told me we were 90 miles from our actual position, though I was reassure by the fact that there was over 3000nm to our destination, if we were only 90 miles out we’d get to the Caribbean alright. As I became more practiced Aline gave me more and more independence, checking how I was doing between steps, double checking my shots, reminding me of little things I may have forgotten, and there were a few times that I missed a step, did something in the wrong order, or simply read the wrong date and had to start the calculations all again. However, by the end of the crossing I was left to do the whole thing alone, by this time I had also got a lot quicker and accurate at doing.

During the day I partook in tasks such as wash downs of the ship, making sure things were back in shape for arrival in St. Maarten, repairing and pressure testing fire hoses, working with the Carpenters, and continuing the general upkeep and maintenance of LSA, Lifeboats and Tenders, the sail system.

Again during the time it seemed like lot of work, and some days were quite stressful, but looking back it was a fantastic to be fully involved in.

  I can’t think of a creative name for my post about Dry and Wet Dock. Dry & Wet Dock / Atlantic Crossing November - December Man, I regret hoping for a more eventful dry dock in…

[seaboundbysunrise]

21.01.2017 - Dirty Names For Tidy Books

If you think that title is dirty you should try putting it after my name... yikes. Short post this time - one week tomorrow I’ll be moving to Warsash. Bloody hell. That came around quickly.

The staff at both Anglo and Warshash / Southampton Uni have been incredibly helpful when it comes to tying up loose ends. I had to call them up the other day to discuss the difficulties I’ve been having organising a drug and alcohol test with my GP (who happens to be the only maritime-approved GP on the Island) and it turns out that quite a few people having been struggling to sort this. I’ve got to admit, I was worried that it was going to be a bigger problem than it actually is - we’re just going to hold off now and try to organise one at Warsash.

I’m sure there’ll be a post later this week once I’ve begun packing.

Until then, stay lucky.

[seaboundbysunrise]

It’s 2017 - happy new year! Apologies for being so quiet on here recently - there hasn’t really been much to report for the last week or so. I’m going to crack on with paperwork tomorrow and have a couple of days healthy eating before my ENG1 on friday.

I’ll probably check in afterwards with what to expect.

Until next time, stay lucky!