Marine Pilot

According to Captain’s visual observance and overheard radio talks, bulk carrier OLIVE BAY anchor chain entangled with the chain of another ship, on Jan 8 or 9, in Yangtze estuary between Chongming island and Taicang, Shanghai area.

Pilots Association for the Bay and River Delaware Pilot Boat JP Virden heading out to put a Pilot on a ship.

Pilot disembarkation from ship (kakinada)
Editors note:
The shown protections are very massive in our opinion.
What does our community think about?

This is the Ben Madigan pilot boat, one of the hard working fleet of Belfast Harbout pilot boats. ( I'm not sure but I believe this might be a Redbay Stormforce, built by Redbay boat builders at Cushendll. )
These fast, sturdy, boats have to ferry Belfast pilots out to large vessels coming in to Belfast harbour. Piloted vessels range from large tankers, bulk carriers, container ships, ferries and cruise liners, right down to barges and fishing boats. Not only this, Belfast Harbour pilots...

Pilot boats in action. The key elements for a safe pilot transfer.

It is not often that this blog is used to show bad practice, however in this case some pictures tell a whole story. Ship is compliant by design for rigging a combination. How about the operator(s)?

For 174 years, the San Francisco Bar Pilots have been safely navigating the world’s largest ships through some of North America’s most challenging waterways.

Pilot Boat Marseille France port

This lady came into port in an excellent day, however when I inspected the pilot ladder prior to board I saw that it was rigged using D-Shackles fastened between the side ropes, transferring all the weight and load of the ladder to the clamps and chokes. Truly an unsuitable method of securing the ladder. Retrieval line was also not above the first spreader
After pulling out the pilot boat, the ship was contacted by VHF and the captain was asked to instruct the crew in the usage of ropes and...