Was home in Thailand looking for work everywhere and finally found out about a ship-management company in Buxtehude, Germany that had lately been looking and employing Finnish officers in their fleet. The company was called NSB Niederelbe Schiffahrtsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG.
I sent my CV and soon enough I got a reply and was asked to travel to Hamburg for an interview and to also apply for the German equivalent certificates, medical and seaman's discharge book. I bought a flight and lodgings at the Finnish seamans mission for almost my last pennies.
Arrived in good order and settled in the mission lodgings, enjoyed a good sauna too. Next day I was on my way with a bus to Buxtehude to visit the headquarters of NSB, the interview was quite straight forward, no tricky questions or anything. More like here is the package, take it or leave it.
When I said I'll take it I got instructions of how to convert my certs at various Gov't instances in Hamburg so next day I had to run and complete all this bureaucracy but in the end of the day I had my CEC, SDB and medical. Next morning I had the early flight back to Bangkok.
Once back in BKK I had to, in addition, also to apply for a US C1/D (seamans) visa and renew my yellow fever vaccination. It took awhile to arrange the US visa but I managed to get it with the paperwork I was provided from the NSB office. The vaccination was taken care of at the Royal Thai contagious diseases hospital. I was good to go.
Some time later I got the flights to join CMA CGM Capella as 2nd officer in Houston, Texas. The arrival was pretty painless, the immigration officer was an immigrant himself and looked a bit irate, the queue of on signing seafarers went through pretty quickly as he shouted "next" and stamped passports more or less not looking at the accompanying travel and joining papers.
I was then picked up by the ships agents and whisked onboard where I was received by another Finn that I was relieving, he gave me a good handover and then he left and I was left to my own devices. The ship itself was the largest cargovessel I've ever sailed with a LOA of 240m and Gross tonnage of 35595. She was built in Ulsan, Korea in 1995 and she was quite sparse vessel with no frills. Messrooms and dayrooms and crew cabins were huge. I was put in one of the guest cabins as there was plenty to go around. Probably the largest cabin I ever had on a vessel too. The bridge was bog standard, nothing spectacular but a working bridge. Only Captain had satcomms for company email purposes, which was painfully slow anyway. We also had a swimming pool that was too small to make laps in.
The work in port was pretty dull, just watching where they discharge/ load and how many cranes + check mooring lines. Chief mate was doing ballasting and most of the time he sat in the cargo office. Crew in general was a mixed lot but mostly Filipino's as ratings and officers European. Captain was ex E. German, a very relaxed man. The C/E was Polish but was later changed to German. We also had two German fitters on deck repairing stuff on her as extra pair of hands, I think they were a riding crew going from ship to ship in the fleet.
Big burly long-shore men were climbing on deck securing containers with lashing bars and placing container twistlocks and bridge fittings. The pace was very fast, boxes were coming and going all the time, there was no idea to try and pass fwd to aft on the shoreside as you had huge containers hovering above you at all times. After some hours the loading was done and it was time to depart, we let go and set our heading for the open ocean, over the Pacific towards China.
Some days later we crossed the Caribbean sea and arrived Panama Canal, another first time for me to transit. The locks in both ends are very efficient as they work on the ingenious design of gravity. No pumps needed, same as in Great Lakes. Vessels were pulled in and out of the lock with small locomotives on the shore side. Panamanian vegetation was very much like jungle, very green and lush. We had no chance to go ashore but some of the Canal personnel came onboard with knick-knacks for sale, I recall buying a remembrance coin of one of their Presidents.
The transit was my first over the Pacific, we thundered on steadily at 20kts and as one knows, once you're far enough from the coast you hardly see anyone. We followed the great circle with our first port being Hong Kong, there we arrived about a month later. From Hong Kong we shifted to Shenzen and then our last port in East was Shanghai before we headed back towards Houston. The port times were only hours but I managed to get quick sojourn ashore in Shenzen for cheap electronics that didn't work, on the other hand I got some bootlegged movies to watch.
On our transit Shenzen to Shanghai the coastal run was a bit of a nightmare with fishing vessels out in multitude, they looked on the radar as a landmass and we did 20kts so the only option was heading to areas where they looked to be a bit thinner and I stood whole watch by the autopilot steering hither and thither avoiding any squidjiggers from getting under our bow. They themselves looked to be quite alert because at times I saw them moving away from our heading.
In Shanghai we had a bit of an incident whilst arriving. The current was something like 2-3kts ebbing and mooring plan was to go past our berth and then the 2 tugs would help us in between the 2 moored ships whilst Captain would give some kick-ahead as needed. I was aft supervising the mooring station and we would have about 20m of wiggle space that meant that once alongside we'd have 10m to the ships ahead and astern of us. The vessel astern of us was also a container vessel, facing us with her stern.
Everything started well, we were perhaps a ships-length past the berth and the tugs got orders to start pushing, as our headway stopped the current also started pushing us astern and I watched how our stern started getting closer to the other vessel. We had 20m to go and I reported it up to the Captain on walkie talkie, then it became 15m and we were still moving astern pretty well. I called up that "maybe kick ahead Captain?", "Ja, ja, I know" came the answer.
I knew then that something was not right so I told the boys to get off the railing and go close to the superstructure. I reported 10m, then 5m and started countdown to zero as we moved, finally we bumped into the vessel astern of us stern to stern. Railing crumpled and paint flakes flew and the ships groaned a bit but the mooring lines of the ship astern of held and I think the Engineer might have managed to get the engine going ahead but too late, at least minimizing damage.
We tied her up and started normal arrival procedures, after half an hour a port official delegation and the Captain from the vessel astern of us came onboard to discuss the incident. The other Captain was an Indian looking chap with golden rings on all his fingers in a boiler suit, he tried to be dramatic about all damages but like us there was only paint scrapes and a bit of damaged railing that could be repaired by a handy fitter with a welding machine.
Our E German Captain maintained our main engine hadn't started when needed and the W German Ch Engineer said Captain had used up all the starting air on approach. I was not totally convinced but that remained the official story. As I had been aft I could not recall how many starts there had been because when propeller starts the whole aft deck is vibrating from the cavitation of the big propeller, in my mind I could only recall one or two. Anyway, papers and reports were signed and everyone disembarked. Loading took place and we departed for USA.
During the transits crew kept busy doing what maintenance they could, Captain had ordered a suckling pig that the Filipino crew prepared one Sunday. The weather was great and so was the pig, we also had some beers but as watch-keeper one has limits. Once a week Captain came on the bridge after lunch and sent me down to do drills. The Company had ISO14001 certification for their ISM coded SMS and it entailed more safety drills, sometimes we watched a safety movie, other times I made table top exercises or held seminars to the crew from the material I had onboard and in PMS system.
I was also in charge of the ships medical chest, it was pretty standard from what I was used to although everything was labelled in German so sometimes I needed the help of a Dictionary to understand the purpose of the drug. We also carried a full dangerous goods pharmacy in case of poisonings etc. For safety gear we also had special suits to wear in case of leaks from dangerous cargo. These are all defined in the IMDG code and two other publications called EmS and MFAG, the latter ones dealing with emergency.
Then as we were approaching Panama Canal off the coast of Mexico I had just come off watch and was on the stern outside taking fresh air following the sky. The clouds became very quickly dark and seas became very disturbed and wind started increasing. Turned out I had seen the start of a hurricane that later wreaked havoc along the coast, we were lucky to only have gotten a whiff of it. Again we transited Panama canal and headed for Houston.
In Houston I had the chance to go ashore and visit the seamans mission within the port limits. It was very quiet with pool table, books, some seating area etc in a large southern style wooden building. It appeared I was the only person there and once I had perused all the rooms and amenities I asked the elderly lady in the reception if I could buy a beer here? The reply came quite testily, "No, we don't sell beer here and it wouldn't do you any good anyway!". Well, all souvenirs were made in China, there was no beer so I walked back to the ship, at least I got to feel land under my feet.
As I came onboard I could see there was somekind of commotion going on and after awhile I learned that the German fitters had decided to finish off a good number of beers before arriving USA and in port they had to do gangway duty. Then a port state inspector had embarked and smelled the stale (or fresh) alcohol on his breath and raised the red flag. In the end Captain had to repatriate both fitters there and then in order to avoid any further sanctions.
Next stop after Houston we went across the Gulf, around Florida and up the coast to Savannah. There I had a chance to meet a Finnish friend who was living there. She invited me for lunch and I asked Ch Mate for going ashore, he said with visa is no problem. So, I went, at the gates they just waved me on after showing my visa. My friend picked me up and I had the best lunch I could recall in a long time with salmon.
Like all good things, it comes to an end sometime and I had to head back onboard, lest I miss the departure. My friend gave me a lift to the gates and there they said I was not on the shore goers list and that I need to contact the agent for the paperwork and so on. Had I had the contacts and a working phone it would've been easy but I had neither and the ship was about to make ready for sea just few hundred meter off me, so I was a bit flustered. Luckily my friend who also works in the port knew the contacts and soon enough the Agent faxed over the sorely needed paper and I was let into the port area. I made it onboard in time.
And so the routine went on, I transited again the Pacific and the next time I was back in Savannah I signed off and flew home to Thailand for my leave. I never returned to NSB as I was offered a Chief Mates position on m/y Titan but that's another story. NSB as a company was good enough but the pay was to say the least meagre and in addition I had to pay taxes to the German Gov't. The office had told me I could get tax deductions for children but they needed to live in Germany, so no help there either. I sent in my resignation and heard they had considered putting me on as Ch Mate on the next rotation but it was too late.
******CMA CGM Capella details:
Length: 240.39 | Width: 32.20 | Depth: 19.00 | Gross tonnage: 35595 | NT: 20276 | Dwt:42655 |
Teus: 3538 | Reefer:150 | Service:BEX1 | IMO number: 9104914 | Call sign: DICB |
Flag: Germany | Manager: NSB Niederelbe Schiffahrts GmbH&Co.KG,Hamburg |
Former names: Ville de Capella, Northern Honour |
Yard: Hyundai Heavy Industries Co.,Ltd.,Ulsan |Year: 1995 |
Main engine: MAN-B&W 7L80M | power: 24010 kW | max. speed:22.5 kn |
Bowthruster: 1192 kW | Aux. power: 3x744 kW
EmS - Emergency Schedules
MFAG - Medical First Aid Guide
SMS - Ship management system
ISM - International safety management code
PMS - Planned maintenance system
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