Shoultz: Subchapter M highlights the need to embrace innovative technology
23 Jun

Shoultz: Subchapter M highlights the need to embrace innovative technology

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Industry News
Recently I had the opportunity to give a talk at the National Academy of Science in Washington, D.C., before a gathering of many of the nation’s maritime leaders. Little did I realize that the subject of my talk, “How Subchapter M Rulemaking Spawned MTS Innovative Technologies,” would be neatly timed during the same week as the publication of the Subchapter…
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27 May

Flags of convenience? Or connivance? And who's really accountable?

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Industry News
LOSS OF PRESTIGE   ****   Sovereignty   - The Flag Goes to Sea                     Treaty of Westphalia 1648    IMO - International Maritime Organization                                  U.N. Agency regulating shipping… 1948    “Ships have the nationality of the State whose flag they fly … there must exist a genuine link between the State and the ship”.                          UNCLOS Article 91(1)   “Every State…
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27 May

Don’t be shortsighted — use eye protection while on the job

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Publication > Professional Mariner
I was the cadet on a containership running between Anchorage, Alaska, and Seattle’s Terminal 5, assigned to the second mate’s watch. On a cold and windy St. Patrick’s Day in the North Pacific at about 0730, I was tracking a couple of targets coming toward us on the 3-cm radar when the wheelhouse door opened. In walked Capt. Virgil Robinson,…
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29 Apr

It’s time to reconsider the value of radar observer renewal

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Publication > Professional Mariner
The red glow from the radar simulator console illuminated the darkness ethereally as I put down the grease pencil and clear plastic ruler at the end of the test for my original unlimited radar observer certificate. I was a cadet at the California Maritime Academy (CMA) and had just finished the practical exam. That test, per U.S. Coast Guard requirements,…
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29 Mar

'Shipbreak' details last voyage, dismantling of US ship in Bangladesh

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Industry News
"Shipbreak" by Claudio Cambon tells the story of the last voyage, dismantling, and recycling of an American merchant vessel in Bangladesh in the late 1990s. Through both words and images, it describes how the ship becomes a touchstone for many groups of people across the world: from the American shipbuilders who built her in the early 1960s and the seamen who worked on her for almost four…
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23 Mar

Lifting the oil export ban will mean bad news for US mariners

Professional Mariner StaffA Mariner's Notebook, Publication > Professional Mariner
In retaliation for assisting Israel militarily after it was attacked, in 1973 the oil-producing countries of the Middle East imposed an oil embargo against the United States. Soon afterward, held hostage by our dependence upon foreign oil, our country began to feel the effects. Gasoline prices rose 300 percent in one year. President Nixon’s administration implemented mandatory gas rationing, as…
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