MARITIME RULE PART 90 PILOTAGE Nigel Meek
Sea Empress Milford Haven 1996
If one specific incident focussed all our minds in recent years it is this one. Sea Empress ran aground and spilled oil in Milford Haven. Recommendations from the enquiry for the local employer and for other authorities to consider: For vessels >30,000 DWT, changes to the number of pilot training qualify trips including day and night transits Improved standard of examination for each additional pilot license authorisation including orals and practical demonstration Trainers to consider the use of simulators for training and examination Pilot was found guilty of incompetence but not misconduct and was demoted by his employer. The rest of the western world began examining their own processes and procedures.
Harbours Act 1950 Local Government Act 1974 Maritime Transport Act 1994 Maritime Rule Part 90 Pilotage New Zealand Port and Harbour Maritime Safety Code Local Government Act 2002
The New Zealand context for such a review was framed up within several pieces of legislation with which you are no doubt already familiar. Harbours Act provided local harbourmasters with authority to organise pilotage in their jurisdiction When it was repealed the authority was split between the Maritime Transport Act and the Local Government Act The first of several versions of Rule Part 90 developed out of the perceived vacuum that existed in that regulatory regime. Along came the Sea Empress and a perception grew that a layer of risk assessment and risk management was missing at a local level. The result was the voluntary code known as the New Zealand Port and Harbour Safety Code. In my opinion the industry has struggled ever since with the national regulator s desire for a national standard and the local regulator s use of the Code for local rules in local conditions
Manukau Harbour Bar
A good example of New Zealand s unique environment and regulatory regime. Before Rule 90 this very large harbour with its dangerous west coat bar was not a compulsory pilotage district. The Auckland Harbour Board did offer a pilotage service if required using pilots trained and licensed by the local harbourmaster. The pilot boarding position was inside the bar because there was no boat available to board outside in the often dangerous sea conditions. In those early days Holm and Company, Northern Company and many others used the harbour to the extent that perhaps eight ships were alongside at Onehunga and others waiting at anchor. There are now only two companies that call regularly and three ships in total. Their masters were grandfathered into pilotage exemption certificates, (PEC s) through Section 47 of the MTA when maritime rule 90 created a compulsory pilotage district. Several of them continue with that regime to this day. We have papered over the cracks with regulations but there is even less economic viability now for a pilot boat to go over the bar so there still isn t one.
Taharoa Express
Another unique environment is centred on the Taharoa Express A huge lump of a ship (146,000 dwt tonnes 74,000 tonnes cargo 270m loa) loading New Zealand Steel ironsand from a single point mooring in the Tasman ocean off the Waikato Coast. A risk assessment several years in the making has yet to see the light of day A harbourmaster assigned by Maritime New Zealand has taken off for greener pastures A poisoned chalice is passing backwards and forwards between MNZ and the Waikato regional council. MNZ currently supply a deputy harbourmaster. Even I was asked at one point if I might like to take the job. The whole environment held together by good luck and the extremely good pilotage skills of one very senior pilot. He is attempting to train a replacement while wearing several other hats.
Akaroa harbour and the cruise liner Millennium
An example of an industry moving faster than a legislative framework. Cruise passengers apply considerable pressure for new experiences on every voyage. At 294m the Millennium always makes a spectacular sight when it enters the confines of Akaroa s extinct volcano. It is at liberty to wander around in there without any pilot because the area is not a compulsory district. Just next door in the very similary sized Lyttelton harbour, there are several very competent pilots who operate in a compulsory pilotage district and offer their services to ships as small as 500GT.
Super-yacht Ice
In a similar vein, the super-yacht industry. At 90m loa. 16m beam. 3268 GT the mega yacht Ice is considerably larger than many of the Pacific island cargo ships that regularly trade in and out of New Zealand. As a private yacht it does not require the master (foreign going) certificate of competency which is necessary on an international trading commercial vessel. A new marina is about to be constructed in Auckland. This vessel has been used as a model for required size. Requests have been received to allow such vessels to tour unaccompanied by a pilot throughout the World Heritage Area of Fiordland National Park which is quite reasonably a compulsory pilotage district. It has been my personal experience that ship masters on such vessels will accede to the owner s orders before any other consideration. Pilots in Bluff and Otago hold the necessary licenses but cannot leave their own ports for the extended periods demanded.
Master s Pilotage Exemption Training Scheme for Superyachts This training scheme has been developed by the regulatory authorities listed below. The scheme is the property of: Northland Regional Council Auckland Regional Council Marlborough District Council Environmental Southland
MNZ and NZMPA were both approached about the problem described. In the absence of a national standard and with the blessing of MNZ the regional councils listed on this slide, Northland, Auckland, Marlborough and Southland, have stepped into the vacuum and developed a draft for a pragmatic regional approach to the vexing problem of pilots for super-yachts.
Master s Pilotage Exemption Training Scheme for Golden Bay Cement
All port companies have approved pilot training schemes. I have highlighted Golden Bay Cement for praise because it is the only domestic shipping company that has a PEC training scheme approved by MNZ. A very proactive operator who instigated new discussions to modify the scheme in conjunction with PoAL and the ARC harbourmaster upon the commissioning of their new facility in Auckland. There appears not to be one other NZ operator who has taken a similar approach. All others appear to rely on internal processes and at some point a discussion with local pilots and a harbourmaster whose regional council might provide a format for generic pilot exemption training scheme.
Bunker barge Awanuia
Another vexed question that looks like finding a resolution only as recently as earlier this week. The only operational bunker barge in New Zealand introduced in 2009 and already completed more than two hundred fuel oil transfers as well as several coastal voyages to and from Marsden Point. She has 3900cu m fuel oil capacity in segregated and double skinned tanks and manoeuvres very easily with azipod units and a bow thruster. Compare this to a regular container ship caller to the same port, which carries more than twice that volume of fuel oil in single skin tanks along its full 291m length. The master of the container ship could gain a PEC if he achieved sufficient transit visits. Yet tankers of any description are specifically excluded from the possibility of being operated by the holder of a master s pilotage exemption. It does appear that a section 47 exemption may now become possible.
Recommendation Maritime NZ should consider amending current legislation and the Port and Harbour Marine Safety Code so as to make harbour Authorities and Harbour Masters directly accountable for the issue and renewal of pilotage exemption certificates The qualifying requirements for PEC renewals should also be reviewed
This reiew in 2006 made two recommendations that have yet to be acted upon. In the meanwhile one ferry company uses the practice of allowing the chief mate to exercise the privileges of a pilotage exemption certificate by the device of calling him the mate/master in what the competing company claims is an unfair commercial advantage because they have a smaller crew.
The Australian Experience National Marine Safety Committee National Standard Competencies for training marine pilots draft for public comment September 2009 Draft regulatory impact statement November 2009 Australasian Marine Pilot s Institute
While the several amendments and reviews of Rule part 90 have been several years in development an entirely different direction has been created in Australia. An enormous amount of lobbying and direct action, firstly by the Brisbane maritime pilots association and then by the Australian maritime pilots association over several years has resulted in the publication of a draft national standard for pilot training, as recently as September 2009. AMPA has become AMPI and has positioned itself to uphold these standards. Victor and I have both been to Australia as observers during the development phase of these standards. Prospective pilots must demonstrate their understanding of key competencies in a units of learning format. The Australian proposal does not require CFG as an entry level qualification. This is more than a little radical and controversial for some pilots. However the idea of competencies and unit standards is well understood throughout the NZ educational sector. My own view is that it merely reflects Government educational policy for the time being, until somebody presents yet another new direction.
HMS Orpheus Mikhail Lermontov
In ending I ask you to consider these two incidents. HMS Orpheus was wrecked when it ran aground on Manukau Bar. The captain was carrying two different sets of sailing directions. Only one seaman on board professed to know the area but was ignored because of his junior rank. Mikhail Lermontov has been the subject of screeds of written material. She was carrying a pilot whose every word was gospel and yet she too ran aground. Can Maritime New Zealand and the maritime community bring the wisdom of Solomon to these two events and create a Maritime Rule Part 90 Pilotage that will avoid these disasters.