Seen a few videos lately about ships pilots, or harbor pilots, or whatever youcall the guys that use their expert knowledge of the waterways in an area to help big ships navigate a particular port safely.
I’m not understanding how they actually direct the vessels they’re guiding in. They’ll be on several different ships each day, each with different handling characteristics, limitations, and the like. There’s no way they can be as familiar with that ship as it’s captain. Even if the ship is being moved mostly by tugs, doesn’t the behavior vary from vessel to vessel (depending on draft, load, construction, etc.)?
Logically, I’d expect them to advise the ships captain on where to maneuver and what to look for, but in most of the videos they’re actually directing the speed of the ship (possibly giving steering directions as well) or coordinating the tugs.
Compare to a valet parking attendant. He drives a different car every few minutes, and most valets rarely crash them.
Although I am not a sailor of any kind, I would imagine a harbor pilot would have a wide experience with ships, and a specialized knowledge of the specific harbor. Sounds like a good combination to me.
Also why it’s a long apprenticeship to become a pilot. The question is reasonable. But between the ship’s officers being familiar enough with the variations in each port and waterway worldwide, and pilots who are specialists in a particular port/waterway, it seems to have evolved as being preferable for the pilot to give actual rudder and engine orders, besides giving orders to the tugs and line crews, neither of which is the expertise of the ship’s officers.
But speaking of being paid relatively well to take great responsibility, a captain is still generally responsible/liable if the pilot is intoxicated, negligent, makes an obvious mistake etc. and the captain does not say or do anything about it in time to avoid an accident, including taking back control of the vessel if necessary. This relationship can vary by waterway though. When a ship is actually in the locks of the Panama Canal the Canal Authority is specifically legally liable for damage caused by a mistake of the pilot. That’s not true in general, and generally private pilot organizations are not ‘deep pockets’ to try to get to pay out damages anyway.
It is not that the pilots know the ship better than the captain of the boat, it is that they know the water better. The captains steer the ship only at sea. On the Columbia River near me a pilot boat takes the bar pilot out to meet the ship while it is still at sea. The bar pilot manages the steering of the ship over the Columbia River bar, a notoriously dangerous crossing, and into the river.
Once over the bar and inside the river, the boat goes to anchor at Astoria until a River pilot is available to take the ship up river to Longview, Portland, wherever. And later a river pilot takes the boat back down to Astoria, and a bar pilot takes is back out to sea, and then the captain of the boat resumes full control.
Steering a big ship is difficult: There is a very long lead time, they don’t track like a car does, and they react to the shape of the channel (and to other boats or walls if you come close).
But they aren’t as different one-to-another as they are different to walking/driving/riding.
This. A ship’s captain may know how to safely cross an ocean, and may have some experience in shallow waters and tight quarters, but the harbor pilot is the expert in the latter category.
There is a school in France, the Port Revel Shiphandling Training Center, where sailors can go to learn how to handle very large vessels. Students train in scale models that are ballasted and powered in a way that simulates the handling characteristics of big ships on a smaller size and time scale, and they are positioned on these ships so that their eyes are where they would be positioned on a full-scale vessel so they get familiar with that perspective. There they learn how to deal with passage across sloped/shallow seabeds, overtaking other vessels, and other situations in which the ship behaves in unexpected ways. They have their own YouTube channel with videos showing various shiphandling scenarios. Here’s a good example showing the movement of a moored ship as another one passes by in a narrow canal; the intent is to show that high-speed passage can actually break the mooring lines.
I did a two-week cruise up around the Norwegian fjords back in November and we paid to go on the behind the scenes tour of the ship. Expensive but well worth it as it was fascinating. The tour culminated with a trip to the bridge to meet the Captain who I asked about pilots. The reason I asked is because on our first night as we dined in the opulence of the restaurant, the Southampton pilot was being transferred back to a little boat right outside our window. It did not look like fun. His reply was that sometimes if he is familiar with the port (Southampton for example), the pilot will literally just observe with no other input. Other times, the pilot will take full control of the ship until it is safely moored. So it varies depending on circumstances.
The most amazing thing he told us was that in some well charted ports, he will routinely take the 76,000 tonne (actually the smallest ship in P&O’s fleet) ship in with only a metre clearance beneath it :eek:
Short version: just like learning to fly large commercial aircraft, there are formal academies where you go to learn this stuff, followed by licensing, followed by working as an officer on a ship, and eventually (with enough training and relevant experience) getting promoted to the rank of Big Cheese.
Not sure about harbor pilots, but I expect it’s not much different. There’s a good article about the Port Revel school here.
Training, lots and lots of training. There are a couple of ways to get seamanship training in my area. Many people have got some of it by being in the Coast Guard, a part of the armed forces for those of you not in the US. But that is just a start.
The local Job Corps has a seamanship program that takes about two years of training, testing, more of both. That will get you on a boat. Then you need a certain amount of sea time, certifications, etc. I do not know the details. The community college has a program, the MERTS, Maritime and Environmental Research and Training, that is another way. So years of training just to get on the boat. It is kind of like an apprentice program and it really takes dedication to not get weeded out.
There are many maritime jobs and all require a lot of training. Tug boats, inland waterways, river barge traffic, etc. But the cream of the crop is the bar and river pilots. And it is a very lucrative job. You can almost go where you want to go and work when you want.
The pilots have to transfer from the pilot boat to the larger ship out in the ocean, a very dangerous feat. Timing the grab to the ladder in less than perfect conditions, because the goods on the boat need to be delivered or picked up, you can’t wait for perfect. Old and out of shape doesn’t work. Sometimes they use the pilot boat, sometimes a helicopter.
I don’t know that that’s a great analogy, as almost all cars that valets drive operate within pretty narrow parameters. There’s a lot more range in ships.
Try giving an 18-wheeler or a tracked vehicle to a valet and I bet they’d have a lot more trouble.
The traditional way is that your father tasks your nursery maid with arranging an apprenticeship for you with an existing pilot. Just make sure her hearing is good.
Also, carefully read your apprenticeship papers if you happen to be born on February 29…
I was the guest in the house of a retired harbor pilot for Colb, Ireland. He recounted how he “drove” the Queen Mary and USS Nimitz back in the Sixties. I imagined at the time that meant he was at the helm steering, but on later reflection realized he was talking about the way you “drive” livestock with gestures and verbal commands, not the way you “drive” a vehicle.
I’ve noticed that people with certain “impressive” credentials tend to describe their work in the most reductive terms possible. Your pilot-host might have been using “drive” in this sense.
I work with a number of ex-USAF people, and one, a former fighter pilot, says he was a “Viper driver.” To me, this phrase exemplifies the laconic self-assurance stereotypically attributed to fighter pilots: “Viper” is (well-known) USAF slang for an F-16, and of course, “driver” is much less exciting that “fighter pilot.” But anyone who describes themselves as “a fighter pilot flying F-16s” is performing for an easily-impressed audience. “Viper driver” tells those in the know that (a) you’ve got a fancy job and (b) you’re secure enough in your own competence to underplay that.
If you ask a Harvard grad where they went to school, you’ll sometimes get the coy response, “Boston.” Yeah, some people react strongly to “Harvard” and it can cause an annoying fuss. But the cognoscenti (especially others with fancy educations) will know exactly what that answer means. If humblebragging had a torrid affair with in-group signaling, their offspring might look like this.
I can think of many other examples, but you get the point. Do you now think that Irish pilot used “drive” this way, or am I off the mark?