20 April 2013; At Sea.

After a long but good day in the Panama Canal, it was time for some relaxation and recharging of the batteries. Starting tomorrow we will have five ports in a row to call at. Warm ports as well, so today was a day to recuperate and get ready.  We had the regular “Pacific” –Ocean weather with a nearly windless sea to look at. Wind velocity did not go above the 6 knots and that is what the Beaufort scale calls a “Light Air”.  We saw turtles paddling by, dolphins showing off, and a few flying fish trying to “take off” but due to the lack of wind, that did not work very well and they all fell back in the water after a few feet. We trundled along with the sedate speed of 12 knots to maintain our schedule for an early arrival in Puerto Caldera.  So the navigators had the unusual experience of being overtaken by cargo ships, which were not going that fast either. We had left the Canal yesterday in the company of a small cargo ship the BBC Ganges which was doing 13 knots, so after 24 hours she managed to overtake us finally on our portside. Today time was flowing by quietly.   

That did not mean that there was not anything happening on the ship. I called a joint meeting today with the deck and engineering officers as we are preparing for the Alaska season. Alaska is a different of kettle of fish altogether compared to the rest of the world. The regulations are very tight and top of that not the same for each area, even while being inside the same state. Thus we have to make certain that both teams are on the same page all the time and the communication is 100% fool proof all the time. That is not always easy, with Dutch-English, Scottisch-English, Philipino-English and a few other “English variations” going on, based on a national language. One of the ways that we reduce mis-understandings and incompletely received messages, is the “closed loop” communication. This is quite simple and goes as follows.

Captain: starboard 10

Quartermaster: starboard 10

Captain: YES (confirms order)

—————-Quartermaster moves the rudder——————–

Quartermaster: starboard 10 on the wheel

Captain: Starboard 10

Quartermaster: YES (confirms that the message was received correctly)

We are now starting to do this with all official Deck- Deck and Deck-Engine communications and the aim is to reduce misunderstandings to zero. Not difficult, but it takes some training as it is a major change after 140 years giving orders and receiving only a short acknowledgement.  For years the industry had been looking at improving the communication between crew with different accents and about two years ago the “Closed loop” communication was introduced in the nautical industry. It is now being taught at schools and at simulators and the pilots of the more advanced countries are taking it up as well. Thus we at are HAL getting into it as well.

Tomorrow we will be in Puerto Caldera. I will be at the pilot station at 0500 hrs. and docked just before 0600 hrs. Official arrival time is 0700 hrs. but I want to be early so there is time to clear the ship before the tours are leaving.