The US tugboat industry needs mates and captains--ask anyone in this shipping industry sector and they'll agree, the market's tight for skilled labor.
Many mates/captains have flocked to the US Gulf for work on vessels servicing offshore rigs drilling for oil in recent years following rising oil prices. Wages there are the highest around; why commadeer a tugboat dragging, say, a cement barge down the Hudson River, when you can make big bucks tending to big rigs in the Gulf of Mexico?
While this has been happening, the number of freshly minted mates/captains out of US maritme schools opting to start their career on a tugboat has stagnated, for one, shipping industry people say, because of massive paperwork and cumbersome education bureacracies that must be battled to get licensed and certified.
In some cases, graduates ready to take the controls of a commercial vessel may simply decide they'd rather work on a cruise ship or other vessel. (With about 12,000 tugs operating around the world, there's no shortage of employment opportunities, industry folks say.)
The only remaining large US independent tug operator, McAllister Towing & Transportaion--85 tugs at 12 ports on the US Atlantic Coast, docking vessels, pulling barges--decided a few years ago to do something about its crew problem: start its own university. They call it "Tugboat U," and it's actually McAllister's internal training program and the equivalent of an associate's degree in nautical science from the US Merchant Marine Academy, which worked with McAllister to set up the program.
The saga of Tugboat U was detailed Wednesday by John Torgensen, McAllister's director of quality & safety, who spoke at the MarineLog Tugs & Barges Conference & Expo 2007 in Stamford, Connecticut., on the topic of "new approaches to training." It became clear to Torgensen two weeks after he joined the company (three years ago) that McAllister had a problem: A barge one of its tugs was towing in the Hudson River hit a rock "and spilled a lot of gasoline. It was clear there was a lack of professionalisn among the crew."
He didn't go into detail, but perhaps a more enlightened (educated?) crew on the job may have been able to prevent the mishap? In some cases, "you'd like to fire [certain crew members], but you couldn't," because there weren't bodies available to fill the positions, he told Platts in an interview after his speech.
So Torgensen decided McAllister needed to train its own crew to become mates and captains and get the skills needed to run tight ships (sorry). Depending on the pool of labor at any given time was not working; the bodies just weren't there or were being lured away by competitors offering higher salaries. (Like one tug/barge operator who, Torgersen said, recently offered captains working New York York Harbor $600/day, $50-$100 higher than the previous high wage for this position.)
In summer 2005 Torgersen turned to Captain Kelly Curtin, nautical science program manager for the Global Marine Transportation School at the US Merchant Marine Academy (and fellow conference speaker with Torgersen) and the result was Tugboat U emerging as a bonafide degree program, which includes classes (including a few in liberal arts) twice a month at McAllister's Staten Island, New York, location.
It takes 490 days to graduate from Tugboat U, to emerge as a licensed and certified mate, (and a holder of a college degree), at a cost of $78,100; McAllister pays the entire amount for all its crew in the program. In the long term it sees the money well spent in what it saves from what it hopes will be a low crew turnover rates which in turn will keep morale high.
And now its own captains are "college instructors," teaching various skills under the Tugboat U program, perhaps giving these seasoned veterans a separate morale boost. "Our captains are now college instructors," Torensen told the crowd of about 50 people in the hotel conference room. "That's pretty cool."
McAllister isnt the last remaining large US independent tug operator, we are the last large "family owned" tug operator.
The costs that you related are the costs of the existing "Apprentice Steersmen" process, not the costs of "Tugboat U".
The costs of Tugboat U are significantly less and include: 245 Sea Days and the dollar costs are: Year One which is mandatory for all deckhands is $300, Years Two and Three combined cost $24,000, and Year Four, the Assoicates Degree Program costs $7000.
Im not a big fan of how you put the quote about not being able to replace people in because there werent bodies available, in the context of the accident involving the barge and the discovery with an aparant lack of professionalism amongst the crews.
The reality is we didnt suspect that there was any issue with professionalism amongst the crews prior to that accident, and thus were not trying to replace the crew.
The crew shortage didnt play a role in the initial accident because we didnt suspect that the lack of professionalism existed until it was driven home to us on that Hudson River reef.
The accident spurred us to recognize the problem, and its relation to and roots in, the crew shortage.
Prudence is the word of the day. If you can't find an able body you don't send them off with distillate, or rather a boat.
One simply shouldn't jeapordize the lives of who knows how many innocent. When a vessel leaves it should be expected to complete a journey not wished for.