IAP Political Forum

So how many oil spills in the US does this make? And I'm also a little curious as to why the Coast Guard didn't act on reporting this immediately.

Holy crap.  How do these things still happen?  I thought that these tankers have layers upon layers of thick steel to make sure that the precious stuff doesn't leak everywhere.  Was it because it was a Korean ship?

No one seems to learn from what happened at Prince William Sound....

The plating of a typical tanker is about 1 inch thick. The loading and unloading punishes the ship's frame in such way that tankers are considered old at 15 years. Yet it's usual that they sail for 25 years before being in such shape that they litherally fall apart and no longer can be patched together for yet another trip. Of course, the last 10 years are full of misery and decay, and it's when most accidents/incidents happen.

Shouldn't it be common sense to get a new ship after 15 years, so people can avoid screwing up the oceans more?

Tankers should have double hulls so this does not happen.  The korean ship should be held accountable.


http://www.imo.org/Safety/mainframe.asp?topic_id=155

Oh, that's what big boys may do -they sell the ship to someone else. And that someone else will use it to make dirty bucks. You know, the ship is old, but still can pass the safety checks. Of course in being old its performace is poorer and it demands more maintenance, so crew costs are cut and maintenance is kept to a minimum (that's standard policy for tankers anyway -don't fix it unless it's absolutely necessary is the rule). Of course, the mix of poor crews (usually poor devils from SE Asia who get paid about 500$ per month) and old ships may lead to trouble, but that doesn't happen often enough for someone taking action. Ships, shall we remind, are still safe enough to be hired & the cargo be insured (that's the crux) and be allowed to enter port...

Yet as they're old they get piss-poor works, are hired for a cheap price to transport cheap cargos (heavy crude, tars, fuel) which aren't worth hiring a newer tanker. And each now and then, the mix of sea (which is a bitch), poor crews and an old ship may cause an incident or even an accident. But, what else would you do? You can't forbid a owner, who usually is a company who owns a company who hires a company who owns a ship -all them based in havens-, to do something legal... and havens are havens because the definition of what is legal includes allowing to sail older tankers as long as they're not caught up in a random check, the insurers refuse to insure the cargo or potential hirers reject them. And even if a tanker is caught up in a random check in a strict country, they may be repaired enough to fulfill the regulations -and not a dollar more- and sail away. Of course whenever they reach the next pory, the travel stress will have taken a toll and the tanker likely no longer will be able to pass a random check... but, it would be so bad if a tanker ran across two random checks in a row! And so they keep sailing, getting their 15,000 to 20,000 $ a day (crew expense, about 9,000 $ a month; fuel expense about 6,000 $ per day at sea, and 1,000 $ when in port; usual taxation 1% of brute income), carrying loads worth 5 to 20 million $ and rendering untold profits once maintenance is discounted.

Old tankers are a way of living to a gazillion of investors, and their legal status usually is so messed up that it takes a very determined Government (and a bit of luck) to ever get a compensation when shit happens.

For an isntance, a wreck that happened in Spain: the ship had been hired by a company based in Cyprus, who was hired by a company based in Panama which was owed by a company based in Panama, which was owned by a holding based in Bahama whose investors had limited repsonsability -and where undisclosed. The load was owed by a Italian company which had boutght it to a Bielorrussian owner which had hired the ship and then sold the contract (for ship and cargo). Half way the load was sold to a third undisclosed customer... and all that is typical for about half of all tankers in the world. Not even the USA inspects all tankers reaching its shores; usually they random check 1 in 20 tankers, which is a lot (even the very serious Dutch random check only 1 in 20 tankers as average).


Oh... and double hulls don't really help much. Double hulls' frames are punished even further than usual tankers and get old sooner, and their external hull plating is thiner to save dead weight. They are safer against spills and minor scratches, but structurally suffer more, their hull is weaker and their maintenance is more demanding. But, nobody is going to pay what it costs a new tanker to carry a cheap load of heavy crude or tars, so the market for cheap and old tankers still exists. And is being filled with egg-skinned double hulls... and in case of structural failure having a double hull means nothing.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/savethebay/sets/72157603040416921/

New interface, old problem: your post isn't showing, Chovy...

nor should it, i changed the theme because i lost that post :)

The spill was not from an oil tanker as all of you presumed.  The spill was from the fuel tank of a container ship that ripped it open when it struck a tower of the Oakland Bay Bridge in dense fog.  Such is the nature of prejudice, it prevents one from even seeking the facts.

obviously it wasn't a tanker -- got that from the picture of the crates...and the lack of oil on the shores.

It's still a bad thing though....

Or laziness... 

Did Nancy open her mouth again?

Or just follow the thread of the conversation. People was talking about tankers, and so I talked about tankers. ::)

BTW, it's me the only one noticing the irony of RF blaming others of prejudice?

And it was good post indeed.  Maybe RF just likes to make quick assumptions so he can make a cheap shot.  In a reasoned manner of course...

A latest developments on oil spills:

A massive storm hit the Black Sea off the coast of Russia, sinking many ships including a Russian oil tanker that split in half.  No one can even measure the type of environmental damage from the oil because the storm was so violent. 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7089317.stm

It boggles my mind to hear of a ship downed in a storm today.

I road through a class 3 Typhone in the Indian Ocean on the USS Nimitz. We where so far from land its unreal and we still found rocks on the flight de ck after the storm. I am talk large ones, as large as someones head. I remember seeing waves cresting the flight deck. We had to net oursleves into our racks. We sustained little to no damage.

Also the only time I have EVER been motion sick.

I hope there wasn't any oil on that ship....

isn't that like the 3rd on in the last week and a half? There are dead birds washing up on shore here (santa cruz, ca) and it is likely not related to the SF Bay oil leakage...but possibly another leak that no one reported.

That's a military ship. Sea trials for military contracts are WAY more extensive then commercial ships. Way more. Just look at all the time and money that's been put into the DD-1000 Zumwalt and it's tumblehull shape.

As for tanker construction, they have about an inch of steel plating, two or three ft of open space and then another inch or two of plating. That empty space has rows (they're called frames) of steel every two or three feet. That's basically 2 and a half feet of space between the cargo and the sea. That's how they're built now.

Accidents, since the Exxon Valdeez (aside from the DE river one a few years ago, but that was unavoidable), have been limited to barges and, in this case, container ships. No doubt legislation will be written to govern the transportation of oil in containers now.

Rocks on the flight deck. Nice.   ::)


I've been motion sick more times than I care to remember. The worst was for almost 3 days of convulsively dry heaving in a stuffy noisy airless overheated cabin that was not going to stop rocking no matter what I did. My whole body hurt for 3 weeks after, but the worst of it was the helplessness and powerlessness. Nothing I could do would make it stop....Nothing!!! ... "Abandon all Hope, ye who enter here"  -- Dante

It sucks to have to come to grips with your own mortality when you're too weak to raise your head to puke. "Not with a bang, but a whimper"? Fuck that. Not my style.

Thank you Yeats. You drunken Irishman.

I've never been that sick again on the ocean since. I'm glad.

That being said, Any boat skippered by Anyone can get in a bind. The key is to recognize the chances for getting in a bind and have methods of dealing with them.

how did you get yourself in that predicament?

I decided to crew on a 42' Cordova purse seiner to fish Togiak, Ak. sac roe herring . It's a long run from Cordova to Togiak in early April. The fishery is incredibly intense. 80% of the harvest comes on the first set of the first opener. Hundreds of thousands of dollars riding on it. Boats must competively jog over the moving masses of fish to be in position to set on the fish on the exact moment the flare lunches the 1-hour season (that's right: one hour). Individual seiners contract (multiple) tender vessels to pump hundreds of tons of herring out of their nets, and spotters to fly above and direct the boat to the most fish. Sac roe herring pays ~$1000/ton to the fisherman and ~$0.03/lb to the tender.

Here's a look at the Sitka, AK herring fishery. A much smaller game than Togiak. Hope you like Incubus:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl4GsBl2MWc

you didn't know you were seasick?

Not until the Rubicon was crossed... :-X

rough seas...man, I remember being on a sailboat below deck and felt nauseous instantly.

Sensory overload is harsh.

i still feel sick, and that was 10 years ago.

Get hold of yourself man... ;D

My first night on a ship I couldn't sleep... AND THAT WAS ONLY THE EAST RIVER. Then I started to realize it was all mental (I was terrified of getting sea sick before I even got on) and I was fine.

Then we got to the Mediterranian. One minute it's like glass, and the next it's got 10 and 20 foot swells and our ships taking 20 degree rolls. The 110 degree (steam turbine propulsion) engine room sucked. People were getting sick left and right, but once I realized that the ship was moving (and not me), it wasn't the problem. Hell, I dared it to get worse. People make the mistake of thinking they're drunk and that they're the ones moving... but I just had to remember it was the enviroment moving around me.

BIG ole' wave that hit our training ship. (http://youtube.com/watch?v=_UaM2RIvFTs)

Oh, it was fun...

:D

only when i recall sitting there, watching the water bob up and down at eye level.

I have spent one 6 month stretch at sea and one 2 month. I do don't get sea sick I get Sea Drunk. I get light headed and silly like being drunk. Oddly I can't drink alcohol when I am at sea or I will barf. I love being on the ocean I can't wait till I retire and live on the ocean. I am gonna be a 55 year old born-again pirate.

You spent 6 months aboard a ship and neither you nor anyone aboard had symptoms of bulkhead disease? Or could you land each now and then?

The longest I've spent on a ship: 5 days

Oh we did stop here and there for a few days. The longest continuous for me with was 90 days. What is Bulkhead disease?

Bulkhead disease is a crude translation of Spanish seamen slang, "mamparitis". It refers to the consequences of being aboard for many months without landing. Not every seaman suffers it and each individual suffers it in a different way -but usually implies one or more of the following: depression, odd behavior, eccentricity, extremely nitpicking behavior, aggressiveness and usually accompanies a severe lack of performance. Put in short, seamen go crazy, and the longer the stay, the more likely to suffer it and the worst it turns. It's the reason why ships used to have handcuffs and a gun aboard for whenever a seaman "went nuts"... The risk starts after 3 months.

This syndrom used to hit hard tanker crews, as it was usual that they would stay aboard for 9 months or more, never landing. Now insurors' pressure has more or less forced to give a land leave each 6 months.

Ah, that makes a lot of sense. We had what we termed "boat rage" extreme aggressiveness. Fights would break out over the littlest things. It wasn't too bad overall. We had laptops, a sega dreamcast, a playstation and internet access, we also had a decent gym to work off most of aggression, so time passed fairly rapidly. 

The longest I've been at sea is 47 days. But that was on a 37' sailboat.
I remember how bummed out I was when I first saw the lights of the Azores and then the Iberian coast. I didn't want to leave the little universe that our boat had become and have to deal with a bunch of random egos, noise, rules, and expectations. I liked my simple little world of air and sea and birds.

"...Depression, odd behavior, eccentricity, extremely nitpicking behavior, aggressiveness and usually accompanies a severe lack of performance" - I felt it all very acutely for an afternoon or two. Then I saw how my 3 other shipmates were all going through the same thing to one degree or another. No one wanted to get back to the beach.
Well, there's only one cure for La Maladie De Bernard - Grog.

A safety meeting was called, and an epic drunk was motioned, debated, and passed by Unanimous Decree.

We stayed hove-to for three days, 220 miles from Gibraltar, while we drank the last gallons of Capitan Morgan, Grand Mariner, Cutty Sark, Skyy, and Lucky Lager we had stashed on the boat. I don't remember much: blasphemies shouted to the wind...Dionysian rites of hubris and sacrificial revelry amid drastic seawater bong hits...The video isn't much help either.
I woke up with a lot of bruises, some minor abrasions, and a brain that had detached from my skull somehow and now sent out waves of pain and dismay whenever I tried to move enough to bungie my eyeballs and tongue from the searing, swirling deck.
Then I realized I had a woodie and that funky smell was land and that the idea of Barcelona in a couple days was actually pretty cool.











http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Moitessier

Well, we were out to sea for 60 days and were on land for about 12 of them. As for "Bulkhead Desease" (which I guess is "cabin fever"), yeah... we got a lot of it, but you try cramming 800 people (750 of which are kids) in THIS (http://www.fsmaa.org/TSES/TSES_VI_NewColor1.jpg) (that's our actual ship) and tell me how much YOU like it.

allpoints, I can relate to your story. Our "cruise" was suposed to go to St. Petersberg, but this was the same time that Putin and Bush were arguing about missile defense last summer, so Russia's State Department sad "No". I hated Bush even more that day.

We changed port, but now we had all this time left over (which was supposed to be spent sailing to and from Russia) so we stayed at anchor off of Gibraltor for 4 days to make up. We were so close we could see the people on the beaches... having fun. We weren't allowed off and we didn't have the comforts of alcohol.

Plus, we were reclemating the poo water we were dumping overboard, so it tasted like shit. Harmless... but disgusting. The whole ordeal was extrutiating.

Good god man, I thought I'd been through some shit. I've crawled through rattlesnake infested rockpiles, cleaned sloppy turds off of fast food restaurant bathroom floors. Been robbed a few times, beat a few times, had guns stuck in my face. Worked a variety of shit jobs.

The poo water is more than I could deal with though. I think I'd be forced to swim to the beach.

The longest I've ever stayed on a boat was two nights. Sailed and camped up the California coast with my stepfather. I've always been told it's folly to go on a boat without alcohol. Kind of like lighting a tobacco pipe with a lighter. You just don't do it.

Luckily it is over now :)
__________________
devices (http://www.topdevices.info/) exercises (http://www.topexercises.info/) patches (http://www.toppatches.info/) pills (http://www.toppenispills.info/) semen (http://www.bestsemenenhancer.info/) quit smoking (http://www.quitsmokingreviews.info/) skincare (http://www.aeobeauty.com/) business (http://www.aeobusiness.com/) career (http://www.aeocareer.com/) communications (http://www.aeocommunications.com/) shop (http://www.aeoshopping.com/) [/FONT]