Commissario
The Suez Canal is currently not blocked
- Thread starter Malevolence
- Start date
Soldato
I’m not inviting you round then as I hate having to take the lid off the septic tank and break up the big ones with a 2x4.
Soldato
MODS! You know what to do....
Associate
I work in the industry and have transited the Suez Canal on multiple occasions.
An interesting one for sure. Could be a number of causes. The company is blaming the wind which is possible but that is the sort of thing you will usually get a bit of a warning of and can compensate for. Could also be to do with interaction between the hull and the channel itself (ie if you go too close to either side the hydrodynamics between the hull of the ship and the side of the channel can start to push you away from one bank into the other). There's also the possibility of a technical failure such as the rudder getting jammed hard over to one side. There are back up pumps etc which you should be able to activate to compensate for this but you would have to react quickly in such a confined channel. Someone above mentioned bow thrusters. Not likely. They are only effective at very slow speeds (less than what the ship would've been doing) and would not be in use during passage in the canal. Also you usually can't just press a button and turn them on, you would need to call down to the engine room and get them fired up, which takes a few minutes. Suez Pilot would almost certainly had the conn of the vessel during the incident but this doesn't relieve the rest of the bridge team of their collective responsibility for the safe navigation of the ship. Anyway something goes wrong there you've not got much time to react. As they have discovered.
An interesting one for sure. Could be a number of causes. The company is blaming the wind which is possible but that is the sort of thing you will usually get a bit of a warning of and can compensate for. Could also be to do with interaction between the hull and the channel itself (ie if you go too close to either side the hydrodynamics between the hull of the ship and the side of the channel can start to push you away from one bank into the other). There's also the possibility of a technical failure such as the rudder getting jammed hard over to one side. There are back up pumps etc which you should be able to activate to compensate for this but you would have to react quickly in such a confined channel. Someone above mentioned bow thrusters. Not likely. They are only effective at very slow speeds (less than what the ship would've been doing) and would not be in use during passage in the canal. Also you usually can't just press a button and turn them on, you would need to call down to the engine room and get them fired up, which takes a few minutes. Suez Pilot would almost certainly had the conn of the vessel during the incident but this doesn't relieve the rest of the bridge team of their collective responsibility for the safe navigation of the ship. Anyway something goes wrong there you've not got much time to react. As they have discovered.
Soldato
Haha I was thinking this too. No matter what the question or thread, someone pops up with actual experience! Love it! This is what makes this place so interesting for me, it's a complete cross section of people and experiences.^^ That's what I love about this forum. It doesn't matter how obscure an issue is discussed, there is someone on here with direct experience of something similar
Associate
Oops. If that's human error then I'm guessing someone's just made themselves very unpopular.
Soldato
Agreed, it doesn't matter what your interests are, there's a thread for it
Commissario
Would it have had a pilot on board or would the captain have been driving?
Associate
Commissario
Oops, sorry - I missed that bit.
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"Lets delay the GPU and other hardware shipment to the UK" that will teach them for coming out the EU.
Soldato
Skim reading again Feek. 
Soldato
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"Someone's going to have to get out and give it a push, lads."
Soldato
^^ That's what I love about this forum. It doesn't matter how obscure an issue is discussed, there is someone on here with direct experience of something similar
Im sure at some point all the GD normalities will happen.
Does the captain have a letterbox etc
Associate
As above the pilot would've almost certainly had the conn but to expand on the point, generally the Captain rarely "drives" the ship. They spend most of the time in their office doing paperwork and being hassled by the office via e-mail.
Most of the driving is done by the deck officers in a rotational watch system (that's what my job is btw). "Driving" consists of monitoring the radar and trying not to hit anything.vHand steering on the wheel is rarely used except when approaching port or in a narrow channel or other confined waters. You are in autopilot 95% of the time (ie, set the autopilot to a certain course and the ship will automatically follow it, adjust as necessary to avoid obstacles and other vessels). I suspect they would've probably been in hand steering in the canal however it is not outwith the realms of possibility to be in autopilot here, some of the autopilots these days are very sophisticated. Still pretty unlikely though, the autopilot can't react as quickly as a human when things go wrong. When in hand steering the deck officers or captain or pilot is not physically on the wheel themselves, there is a dedicated helmsman who does that (that's not their only job, if we are in autopilot they will be doing lookout duties etc). But anyways whoever has the conn gives the helmsman an order such as "steer heading 180°" and they will keep the ship on that heading until you tell them otherwise. You can then concentrate on other things, like watching where you are going.
Regardless of any of the above, the Captain still has overall legal responsibility for what happens on the ship. So he could be tucked up in bed asleep and the 2nd mate on watch could run the ship aground and the Captain would still go to jail despite the fact that he was in bed at the time. I think a lot of Captains struggle to sleep!
Does the captain have a letterbox etc
No, but he generally has about 500 e-mails a day to respond to from the office about all manner of nonsense.
I've heard a rumour there may have been a blackout (ie complete loss of power) which certainly could've caused something like this but there will be all sorts of rumours flying about at the moment, who knows. There will be an accident report released eventually but these things take months/years to come out.
Probably a daft question, but what is stopping the container ship behind the stranded one from running a line to help tow it off the shore?
Is it because the shallow depth of the canal would prevent ramping up the propeller fast enough to give enough force?
Is it because the shallow depth of the canal would prevent ramping up the propeller fast enough to give enough force?