06/002 - Chief Engineer Workload

Bunkering operations:

Over the past 25 years the bunkering operation is the” most talked about” regarding Pollution incidents but hardly any improvement has taken place in this operation. Whatever time the vessel anchors the bunkers are mostly supplied in Night time, as the supply barge crew want to earn extra overtime. The new aspect being the ISPS code, none from the bunker barge would like to board the ship. They usually adopt the novel way of sending papers across in a Bucket ,to be signed by Chief engr.

The barge does not accept any stamps, remarks on Receipts. Always the vessel Soundings are to be inaccurate though the barge after bunkering has become lighter and rolling Heavily, no proper sounding tables to check with-Barge soundings are always Correct.

Why can’t the barge or the ship supplied with a sealed flow meter to be connected at the manifold like a Sampling flange? Another argument is if the barge pumps “Air” flow meter tends to “Run”.

All the companies I sailed with expect chief eng to be a magician creating oil from nowhere. He is instructed over phone (nothing on paper in B& W) to “pocket” some oil when he can , during tank cleaning operations mostly, so that it can be compensated for the short supplies in bunkering. With the escalating price of bunkers everybody wants to find out if chief eng is “stealing” some bunkers, especially charterers. So they appoint a surveyor who is a local guy and can speak the dialect with the barge guy (meaning he is on their side). He can always instruct the barge to short supply if he finds about the excess oil the vessel has, if any. The surveyor after the short supply acts as a middle man to adjust the short supplied quantity shared by the barge and vessel equally (half-half).still the vessel ends up short.

All these are done when chief eng and the fourth eng are awake continuously for 20 hrs, everybody trying to find out “why the ship is delayed for xxx hrs when the bunker finished at xxx hrs”. I have seen the captains telling the chief eng to “sign the bloody papers” so the ship can sail, as pilot is booked in advance knowing that the bunker will be Finished at so and so time. Some captains gracefully allow the chief eng to adjust for the loss or short supply by allowing some Time gap or stoppage at sea,

Though the safety is stressed upon, the transit from the ship to the barge is most scary and Un safe to be done in night time. The weather is bad, rainy, thundering but the bunkering is done regardless of these. Minimum deck hands are kept for bunkering so the mooring and putting pilot ladder has been added to the misery of chief eng. He has to constantly ask, plead for extra hands, walkie talkies during bunkering.

I have come across (only once) in one Company where chief eng had a walkie talkie for bunkers and from captain to deck hands everybody wanted it “desperately” creating a big tussle and ultimately chief eng losing his patience and returned the walkie talkie to master so that he can live in Peace, much to the Happiness of everybody.

Overhauling Main engine Units at sea:

Some companies I sailed with had this novel way of instructing the ship to stop at sea and overhaul units. Mostly we used to sail in day time and stop during night and overhaul the cylinder in record times. This operation also causes Fatigue among engineers and can cause accidents.