A Fine Cut of the Jib

Until this year, the Newport- Bermuda sailing race was not on my radar. It is sailed every 2 years from Rhode Island, and my Alma mater usually sends a boat crewed by midshipmen. This was not enough to pique my interest in the past, yet Somehow, it came to a special place of prominence in my mind. One factor is that Orsted, a major Danish renewable energy company, has become a major sponsor of this race. Offshore wind has been creating many good career opportunities for American mariners, and the proximity to the coastline allows for better work-life balance than traditional deep sea shipping. Another key factor: Friends and their family have been boosting the hype on social media. The parents are old enough to have time to sail, and the kids old enough to have knowledge gained through experience on the water. According to race announcers, this year brings quite a few novices to the race. Relative youth is an advantage: As the starting line emcee put it on Friday. Don’t be older than the length of your boat. That is, older folks should ride in the relative comfort of a larger sailboat. See the contenders' current positions here at: https://cf.yb.tl/nb2024 PS, I'm following Assarain IV.

Reconsidering the Maritime Academy: California's Case

Sometimes, I feel that I am repeating blog posts, but with new information comes new angles for reporting. In this case, California State University's (CSU) Maritime college will be merging with a larger polytechnic program by 2026. That maritime college in Vallejo seemingly re-invented itself in the 1990s, but what has worked for two generations no longer works so well. Since 2018, enrollment has fallen by a third, and new capital investment is required to maintain dormitories and other facilities. As a professional school, there is a requirement to wear uniforms to class, stand "watch" as an on-campus job, and to abstain from marijuana (due to the use of a federally-subsidized training ship). Optimistically, CSU intends to retain the maritime licensing program. Yet, these afflictions seem strange due to the fact that CSU operates the only four-year maritime program on the West Coast; five such programs operate in the Eastern time zone, plus Texas A&M in the Gulf Coast (recently blogged about their new tuition policy). The 1990's were a transformational time for maritime colleges in the United States. The labor-intesive American ships built during World War Two were finally retired from service, leaving a smaller fleet of ships for newly-graduated merchant officers to sail. With the Cold War over, Navy veterans downsized from military service provided skilled manpower with little need for new education, under laws and conventions of the era. To this end, the Marine Engineers' Beneficial Association (MEBA) apprentice program in Easton, MD was closed in favor of continuing education for existing mariners. Then-Vice President Al Gore slated the US Merchant Marine Academy for closure- it is still open. Each state maritime academy began offering new majors, often without the uniform and military-style training requirements. Such new degrees tended to be adjacent to the maritime field, with offerings in logistics, international business, security, and facilities management. Organizationally, only two of the six state schools left the 1990's as autonomous institutions; the transformation of California Maritime Academy into a CSU campus was so complete that it earned the name of "casual maritime academy" due to the students' increase in rights and priveleges. There was certainly dissent about the "dilution" of regimental culture at the time. One alumnus filed a lawsuit against the Maritime College of New York, stating that use of the waterfront Fort Schuyler campus in the Bronx was restricted by the US government to training licensed maritime officers. Such an forestalling effort failed. Despite the maritime orientation of these colleges, oceanography and marine biology are often taught elsewhere. Out of the six state maritime academies, only Texas A&M is a designated Sea Grant University with focus on ocean research. Scholarly research seemed at odds with hands-on, employment focused learning. In the end, restructuring allowed these maritime colleges to exist for Gen X and Millenials. Peak college enrollment of the year 2010 came and went. Maritime colleges, offering graduates high starting salaries, continued to ride high. To this end, CSU Maritime appears to be unique it its troubles caused by a confluence of factors. First is the freshman attrition rate, where many students decide that college, and especially a maritime program, is not for them. Second is the general decreased interest in a college degree: Many of the students in adjacent degrees were not focused on a maritime career, but attended college as low-propensity, general ed students. Third, due to crew shortages, many would-be maritime students are going straight to work, collecting a paycheck instead of paying tuition, and collecting promotions based on work experience rather than classroom time. Unless they happen to have GI Bill Benefits, or a funded college savings account, it is unlikely they will return to a maritime college once they are working in the industry. It appears that, unlike the 1990's, CSU Maritime will be going through its next transformation alone. The unspoken truth is that most college-educated mariners leave shipboard work within 5-10 years of graduation. Thus, going to sea is no longer the way of life, but part of it. Incorporation of a maritime program into a college with other operationally-focused majors will provide strengthening synergies to both the student and the institution.

Harrison Butker’s Thoughts

Like Harrison Butker, the embattled kicker for the Kansas City Chiefs, I was once a brash 28-year old, working in an industry that supports sole breadwinners, and attending a Catholic parish that adhered to the Missal of 1962- the Traditional Latin Mass. Nostalgia for Catholic Integralism of mid-century Spain, Italy, and big-city America; and Christian Democracy of France and Germany, ran strong. Yes, I was 28 when I lauded the Dobbs decision as a harbinger of a New Deal for families. (For the one-year anniversary of the decision, I issued a Mea Culpa on this blog, as I did not then realize the lack of compassion of many so-called “pro-life” legislators in the South). What is so appealing about fighting the “diabolical lie”, which to Butker is concept that career comes before family? For many middle-class families- especially those without a four-year degree, the single income family is still an ideal. For those with masters and doctorate degrees, this concept is an anathema. Thinking as a neoliberal, one must be a reactionary- a neanderthal- to be willing to shrink the GDP. Would such a focus on the family be “turning back the clock”? In the United States, dual income households had been on the rise since 1940, despite some retrenchment at the end of World War Two. With this option came an increase of living standards, followed by an ever-consuming increase of living costs. In Promised Land, an economics book I recently read, David Stebenne explains that this switch between freedom and necessity of a second income happened around the 1958 recession, earlier than the peak era of second-wave feminism. During the 1950's, investment in business development had lagged, in favor of high wages for the working class. It was not sustainable. The single wage earner never completely disappeared, at least for the part of the middle class that obtained special skills and education at reasonable cost. In fact, such a concept proves to be an unbreachable wage floor during labor negotiations. The appeal for motherhood and domesticity; in contrast to harsh, male-dominated industrial environments, provides the rallying cry for better contracts. Maybe in the future, emotional appeals will be gender-blind, but for now, Butker’s ideas buttress the middle class way of life.

Unreported News on the Non-Compete

Non-compete clauses got out of hand. Once a reign on executives and professional employees, many lower-wage employers have been telling their employees that they can't leave their job for another in the same field. Nursing assistants, fast food workers, and janitors are some of the employees who have recently found themselves sigining such agreements. However, these are not common in the shipboard side of the maritime sector. Since the Seaman's Act of 1915, as lobbied for by Andrew Furuseth, the American seafarer was permitted to "break articles" in any US Port. While I have not found an explicit requirement to allow seafarers to choose a different employer, it is certainly implicit in the culture surrounding seafaring, where employee's ties to a company are weak, and ties to a union and job hall being strong. To be fair, the system of impressement that existed prior to 1915 (and that still exists globally) was replaced eventually by strong unions and a "closed shop" hiring system for ocean-going, unionized ships. Within this system, there is mobility between different companies and different types of ship (one could be on a car carrier one voyage, and on a grain ship the next). However, as written by John Konrad from GCaptain, maritime wages have stagnated under the closed shop system, where unions would compete against each other to sign a contract favorable to the employer. A new generation of union leaders, who labored under these conditions, agreed to allow some healthy competition through a mechanism known as a passthrough agreement. This would incentivize shipping companies to sign more generous contracts, as poorly-paying ships would be unable to find crewmembers. Reducing the barriers to personal economic competitiveness is working in the maritime sector. How about the rest of the nation? California became a leader in tech and other innovation due to its longstanding, strong prohibition on non-compete clauses. Predominately in the near-South and the West, state legislatures and courts have invalidated many classes of non-compete clauses, and to do so through nationally through the Federal Trade Commission would follow a winning trend.

Finding the Trail

Last May, I started hiking the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (C&O) trail. I completed the first hundred miles in two stretches. The greatest part of this trip is planning and preparation. Plan for stops, how much food to bring, and where more supplies can be obtained. Well water service on the trail begins in "mid April" and runs to October; without such amenities, more pack weight would be allotted to carrying bottled water. Preparation also includes the physical aspect of 15-20 miles per day with a backpack. Such naievity kept last year's hikes to two-day jaunts. By joining and detaching the trail at various towns, I have a little experience on how we have, and have not, maintained our transit infrastructure. The easiest entry points were those served by Maryland's commuter trains, specifically thr MARC Brunswick line, which serves Washington, DC and intersects the trail at Point of Rocks and Harper's Ferry (yes, John Brown's Harper's Ferry). More challenging, but doable is Williamsport at Canal Milepost 100. An airport shuttle known as the Bayrunner stops in nearby Hagerstown, and there is a city bus that connects to Williamsport, or more likely, one would take Uber or Lyft to maintain a schedule. Cumberland, the western end of the trail at milepost 184.5, has a daily Amtrak train, the Capitol Limited, that runs between Washington, DC and Chicago. I hope to provide a review when I ride it in several days' time.

On Ships and Bridges

From the trestle of the Baltimore Harbor Thruway (I-895), one can glimpse a glaring sight to the south. A highway ramp ascends, only to abruptly end in clear sky. This was not the sight of construction or planned deconstruction, but the result of an accident at sea. A couple weeks ago, the MV Dali collided with the Francis Scott Key Bridge while leaving the Port of Baltimore. Chief Engineer Michael Buckley was one of the first to theorize on social media the exact sequence of electrical problems that the ship experienced before the catastrophic collision. The NTSB also independently focusing on electrical issues. Notably, the tugboats that normally assist ships out of harbor had turned back to the pier by the time of collision. Tugboats cost shipowners money, and in the absence of regulations and laws, they are cut loose at the first opportunity. The harbor pilot was still onboard, but was literally powerless to advise the ship's master in stopping the collision course. Anchor watches are not maintained on merchant ships, and steering gear handpumps take minutes to respond. The radios did work, and the state police saved lives by closing the bridge to road traffic. Although six road workers perished upon collison, two were successfully rescued from the water. Several strategic National Defense Reserve Fleet vessels are currently isolated from the sea. After longtime Senator Barbara Milkulski of Maryland retired, the hospital ship USNS Comfort and an aviation repair ship were relocated to Norfolk, Virginia to reduce sailing time to open ocean from 12 hours to 3 hours. The ones remaining in Baltimore are general cargo vessels. Fort Smallwood Park is located on a penninsula just south of the Key Bridge. Offering a good view of the harbor, I sought to observe salvage operations. However, the park was closed to the public, with a police officer standing guard to turn voyeurs around. Attention was thus directed away from the gnarly steel spectacle, and towards a memorial of photographs, flags, and six large crosses erected in honor of the lost road workers. Honestly, without electrical power, there is no ability to steer the ship. For this reason, tugboats are required for large ships such as oil tankers; I expect that this rule will be expanded to all large ships in the future. I have attached the opinions of a Chief Engineer who worked for the shipping company involved, and which I believe to be mostly spot-on.

Do You Draw Straws? Which Crew Must be in the Lifeboat

On a cargo vessel, there are twice as many lifeboat seats as the maximum crew and passenger capacity. If the lifeboats on one side of a ship are unusable due to damage or excessive angle of incline, there will be enough seats on the usable side. When I was on a ship with one temporarily- disabled lifeboat, part of crew travelled to the next port by airplane, so that this safety law would not be broken. The station bill lists lifeboat assignments and duties for crew and passengers. For simplicity, crewmembers assigned to the working lifeboats would continue to exercise those roles, such as launching or steering away from the ship. If it turns out that only one lifeboat out of four is launchable, and there are not enough seats, there are inflatable survival rafts located adjacent to the lifeboats on either side of the ship. Much better than their World War Two era predecessor that resembled a giant floating donut, these modern models offer the opportunity to stay fairly dry while under a canopy. Here’s an exercise for ethics and ship’s management: who should get the better chance for survival in the lifeboat, and who should be sent to the raft? The lifeboat needs two engineers in case engine or electrical adjustments are required. The shock of a maritime casualty has incapacitated many would-be survivors, so all survival tasks must have two people assigned, to ensure that the job gets done. Lifeboatmen, or “Persons Proficient in Survival Craft”, are officers and able seafarers who are trained in navigating and managing day-to-day life in a lifeboat. Part of this qualification used to require demonstrating competency as a coxswain while rowing a boat with your classmates or shipmates. You can never have too many lifeboatmen on your lifeboat, although each raft should have at least two qualified personnel. Contrary to popular belief, the captain should avoid going down with the ship. The captain is an established authority figure to the crew, but more importantly, someone with celestial navigation skills. (For about 20 years, the US Navy dropped this competency, relying instead on GPS navigation on the ship, or a quick rescue by a coalition vessel if the ship must be abandoned. This competency has been restored.) Always bring a successor as well- the second mate is often the most proficient at navigation, as part of their daily shipboard duties of charting course. A modern enclosed lifeboat, an orange jellybean of sorts, is self-righting, provided that occupants remain seated, and that the lifeboat is not overweight. They also have engines, while rafts require rowing or towing. Inflatable rafts lack this self-righting feature, so anyone who can’t pull the weight of the raft, or the oars should be in the lifeboat. Think exit row on an airplane- children, the ill, and the very elderly. The lifeboat will be much drier than a raft. The chief steward or cook is often delegated the responsibility of managing food and water rations. While a survival amount is pre-staged inside the lifeboat, bottled water and non-perishable carbs and protein will be brought onboard if time permits. The medical officer, if there is one, may bring a go-bag onto the lifeboat. Anyone with metal implants or artificial limbs must ride in the lifeboat, due to the risk of puncturing the raft with sharp objects. Anyone who is not in a survival suit- an orange or red wetsuit issued to all crew- should be in the lifeboat. Negligence should not be assumed- survival suits are mostly kept in staterooms, not workplaces, and crewmembers are discouraged from returning to their rooms for missing items. Most importantly, fill the darn seats. On the RMS Titanic, an Edwardian sense of propriety sent lifeboats away with empty seats. I did this tabletop exercise as Leadership and Teamwork Training as a Third Engineer, but didn’t realize it until now. The scenario was choosing eight people to travel from a disintegrating moon colony in an escape pod. They had to keep it abstract.