Feature Focus – Professional Mariner

A modern maritime service can deliver what the nation needs

By Rear Adm. Mark Buzby and Capt. Doug Burnett, U.S. Navy (Retired) In 2020, Proceedings published the fictional story “Losing the Great Pacific War for Lack of Ships and Mariners.” The article included an image of laden ships stranded in U.S. ports because there were no available crews. Unfortunately, that image represents reality today. On Nov. 21, 2024, the Navy confirmed the removal…

Test site for wave energy is nearly open for business off the coast of Oregon

A university in the Pacific Northwest has completed installing electrical infrastructure that will serve as a test site for wave-power generation devices. The project, which spanned two years of design and engineering and about 90 days of on-the-water work, required mobilizing specialized vessels and dozens of mariners. The project highlights the need for West Coast marine fleets and infrastructure to grow…

The status of decarbonization in the maritime industry

From the editor’s desk at Professional Mariner, it might seem as if the maritime industry is well on its way to a “green,” zero-emission future. As regulatory demand and fluctuations in fuel prices have driven the development of alternatives, many of the headlines we run announce the commissioning or launching of a new low-emission vessel, a pilot program for a…

Facing a demographic cliff, maritime academies brace for the future

You’d never know the California Maritime Academy has been dealing with chronically low enrollment based on the number of people attending an open house in mid-February. On a chilly gray morning, prospective students and their parents shuffled around the school’s 92-acre Vallejo, Calif., campus tucked against the Carquinez Strait on San Francisco Bay. Young people collected pamphlets and swag branded with the “Keelhauler”…

Battery-electric propulsion: Pros talk pros and cons

Modern mariners now know that electrical propulsion-based storage batteries, or in some cases, fuel cells, is growing rapidly. There are plenty of similarities between these emerging technologies and combustion-based systems that have ruled the waves for nearly two centuries. But unsurprisingly, there are many differences — and those differences come with challenges. From the vantage point of Corvus Energy senior…

Training ice pilots in virtual reality

On Dec. 9, 2024, Alexandra Jahn, a climatologist of the University of Colorado, presented research she had made with a Swedish colleague to the American Geophysical Society in Washington: Depending on seasonal factors, the projections of the two researchers showed that the first “ice-free day” may occur in the Arctic by the end of the current decade, which conventionally means…

Bumpy year for offshore wind lets maritime infrastructure catch up

For America’s nascent offshore wind industry, the last year was the best of times and the worst of times. In the past 12 months, American offshore wind development reached some key milestones. Foundations were laid and turbines were installed at the nation’s first two commercial-scale offshore wind farms and those farms generated their first megawatts. The first U.S.-flagged turbine installation…

Clearing the Air: New technologies drive vessels forward

The development of ‘green’ vessel propulsion systems stands firmly fixed as one of the top five critical issues facing the maritime industry in 2024. “Markets are beginning to accept that fossil fuels will be needed in the transition [to zero carbon fuels], while owners adopt operational measures such as vessel speed, maintenance, and route optimization as new technologies and designs,…

ABS unveils new comprehensive classification standards

In an industry first, the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) has introduced a comprehensive approach to support development of the next generation of vessel designs and equipment employing the latest technology driven by decarbonization and digitalization. The classification group’s updated Marine Vessel Rules now include an extensive set of newly developed functional requirements and a standardized risk-based methodology which provides…

Training mariners for a safe and efficient career at sea

Despite the downsides of a maritime career, a professional life at sea can provide high pay and good benefits, interesting and meaningful work, and exciting experiences that stretch to the horizon and beyond. A variety of mariner jobs beckon with learning the right way to do things in the wheelhouse, on deck and below, playing a critical role in developing…