This is how marine pilots go to work (found on Twitter, by Capt. Ed Enos)

Most pilot embarkations and disembarkations around the world, are still carried out using a traditional pilot ladder, consisting of wooden steps supported and secured by side ropes.

Tuesday, October 1st is the start date of the latest International Maritime Pilot Association's annual Safety Campaign.

Previous campaigns by the association have consistently shown results of pilot ladder deficiencies around the 20% mark.

There are many things in both our everyday and professional lives which we take for granted and never question the origins of, an example of this might be the IMPA recommended ‘pilot mark or pilot line’, which is sometimes seen on the side of vessels indicating where a vessels freeboard exceeds 9 metres.

APL Belgium in rough water near the Farallon Islands pilot station.

The Coast Guard Office of Investigations and Analysis has released Marine Safety Alert 05-21, to notify mariners to a potentially dangerous situation involving corrosion of the turntable pin on accommodation ladders.

Editor's note: The pilot boarding seems a bit improvised and unsafe to me, but that's certainly business as usual, isn't it?

Harbor Pilot Nasir Khan from Pakistan has sent his own checklist to Marine-Pilots.com - we share this list for our readers and look forward to an interesting discussion.

Produced by Safehaven Marine

From that moment on I have been keeping a tally of the non compliant boarding arrangements I see in front of me on a daily base, and off course I participate in the annual safety campaign, conducted by IMPA each october.