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Its been a while

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 16:32:12 +0100

Well I now have only 6 weeks left until I leave the Island Escape on the 7th of October. I have been very busy the past few weeks completing my operations and navigation workbooks as well as getting tasks signed off in my training record book.

I haven't bothered doing regular posts as I haven't really had much that I can say its would be a bit boring if I just posted lots of entries saying today I did a compass error from the sun/moon/star so I shall sum up the past 12 weeks in one.

For arrivals and departures where I wasnt on watch I have been in charge of forward or aft mooring alternating every so often as well as dropping / heaving anchor when we were at tender ports.

When I have been on watch during the arrival / departure I have spent the time plotting the ships position on charts as we entered and left the harbor - I am now quite good at doing it within 15/20 seconds with 2 ranges and bearings - although I still have the odd screw ups where I pick the wrong bit of land but the frequency of that happening is decreasing.

I have now done all 3 watches initially doing 8 - 12 then 4 - 8 then 8 - 12 again and at present I am on the 12 - 4 watch. 4 - 8 is definitely my preferred watch its busy as nearly all the arrivals or departures fall during it and it goes really quickly. The most hated one has to be 8 - 12 as onboard here it means you also have to do arrivals / departures but they fall outside your watch time. 12 - 4 is in the middle between the two it sometimes goes quickly and can be interesting other times it goes slowly just depends on what you have to do and if theres any traffic around.

We also had a bit of excitement a few weeks ago when a passenger became very unwell while we were steaming towards Mahon around 24 miles off the coast of France. The captain after consulting with the doctor requested a medical evacuation and a french navy helicopter was sent to airlift the passenger to hospital in Toulon.

It was complicated by the helicopter having to bring additional equipment to stabilise the patient so the helicopter came out dropped off doctors from shore and some equipment then returned to Toulon to refuel it returned just over an hour later and lifted the doctors equipment and passenger off and away to hospital in France.

From our point of view it was quite good it gave us experience of working with helicopters and communicating with MRCCs as we were allowed to handle the communications and get involved with preparing the ship for the winching operation (clearing balconies removing loose objects from outside decks removing the dressing lines and lights as well as keeping passengers away from the aft decks of the ship).

For anyone wondering the information we received later was that the passenger was fine and had recovered in hospital.

As I mentioned in a previous post the dancing is still going on every Saturday. I wasnt able to upload the videos yet but I will once I return home.

For those who can not view the photos on FaceBook I have included 3 in this post; top: tank inspection middle: uniform swap party bottom: Jimmy and me.

A quick entry

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 12:33:55 +0100

Well its now almost 8 weeks since I came onboard and I am now settled into the watches. Marc and myself are rotating around every 2 weeks currently I am on 4 - 8 with Marc doing 8 - 12.

Were both progressing with the tasks in our TRBs and I dont really have much else to say at the moment.

Were in Barcelona tomorrow so I will upload the dance videos there. Theres also a few new photos that I have added to facebook.

Hello from the Island Escape

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:57:57 +0100

Well I have now been onboard the Island Escape for just over a week and a half and am all settled in. There was a little bit of confusion when we arrived - no one knew we were supposed to be coming - but that was all sorted out quickly and we got put into a passenger cabin for a few days until they had a cabin ready for us.

Our training is a lot more organised this time with both Marc and myself having drawn up a plan of what we are going to do over the next 4 months and as with the Island Star all the officers seem happy to help us learn.

The Island Escape wasnt originally built as a cruise ship and this is apparent with the maze of corridors which make up the crew and some of the passenger areas especially all the random stairs so its taking a bit of time to get used to it.

So far weve really been just completing the safety tasks finding our way around and working with the fire patrol guys with the lifeboats. Were also helping the LSA officer with his monthly life boat inspections - this ship has 10 open life boats and 4 tenders so there a bit different from the Island Star.

Ive also been on the mooring decks for arrival / departure or up on the bridge dealing with the paperwork talking to the pilots and getting used to the different way of working.

Marc and I have also been dancing for the passengers the dances are a bit different on this ship - so that confused us - especially when its the same songs just different steps (not that I can dance anyway)!

End of College... almost

Wed, 14 May 2008 13:59:20 +0100

Well that's the last "proper" college phase now finished although rather annoyingly I have to hang around until Thursday 22nd to sign some forms! So I have an entire week here doing nothing!

I do return to college for 3 weeks orals prep at the end of this sea phase and then a few weeks of short courses before I sit my OOW Oral examination ("orals") with the MCA next June/July if all goes well.

I have also passed my MCA Signals Oral examination yesterday and should be able to pick my certificate up from the college next week sometime.

Anyway I will probably write some more before I go away to sea.

Ps. I am now on Twitter which I will be using while I am away at sea to let you know where I am and if I am doing anything interesting while at sea. You can subscribe to automatically receive my updates (via txt / email or just on the web) at http://www.twitter.com/alistairuk - you will require a free twitter account to subscribe.

Independence of the Seas

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 15:08:54 +0100

Sorry for the bit of a delay in posting but since things have been reasonably boring the past couple of weeks I didnt really see any point in posting.

I am now starting college week 40 (in course terms thats week 5) and the classes are now beginning to finish up (theres another 2 weeks left of classes) before we all get to go back to sea.

As anyone who has even the slightest interest in cruising will know one of the worlds largest cruise ships "Independence of the Seas" arrived in Southampton in the early hours of yesterday morning prior to its naming ceremony on Wednesday.

For those that dont know she is the 3rd ship in the Royal Caribbean Freedom Class weighing 160000 GT with a length of 339m and a bream of 38m at the waterline (364m long 60m wide at longest/widest points).

According to her AIS information (courtesy of a cool web site called AIS-Live.co.uk) she is heading off for a mini cruise to the Channel Islands on Sunday.

When I went wondering down to the Mayflower Park yesterday she was carrying out a boat drill with all her port side lifeboats in the water. Interestingly she does not have tenders which I suppose makes sense trying to do tendering operations with that many passengers is going to be a real nightmare.

I do still wait with interest the newest Royal Caribbean ship currently called Project Genesis which will be even bigger weighing a massive 220000 GT and carrying 6400 passengers! She is currently under construction in Finland and is due to be launched sometime in 2009!

Anyway this has turned into a rather random posting not at all related to my college phase so please excuse that :)