Those Who Serve: Columbia River bar pilots risk their lives to guide cargo ships

A pilot ladder is a highly specialized form of rope ladder, typically used on board cargo vessels for the purposes of embarking and disembarking pilots.

Pilot debark from Battleship Texas to pilot boat Galveston following the relocation of the battleship to another pier. There was a second pilot who later debarked from Battleship Texas to pilot boat Texas.

Turkish Straits , Istanbul Strait , Maritime Pilot , www.turkishpilots.org.tr

Pilot transfer arrangement is a sensitive topic to be discussed among the pilot’s fraternity. Although ships are designed and operated with compliance to the SOLAS requirements in all respects including the pilot transfer arrangements, there has been numerous deficiencies observed related to pilot transfer arrangements. The small deficiencies from the part of ships cause life threatening accidents for pilots and sometimes to the ship staff themselves. There are many instances of defective ladder and complacency in proper rigging of ladders has been reported almost every day in different parts of the world. Many pilots lost their life, severely injured for life and face many minor to major accidents. The latest incident being the Capt. Timothy Murray of Sandy hooks Pilot.

Tug power has increased considerably over recent decades. Today, some ship handling tugs have a bollard pull of more than 100 tons. In addition, high tug power can be installed in ever smaller compact hulls.

A collection of action from the St Johns Bar Pilot Association In the early 1800′s as the commercial ports along the St Johns River began to develop, a select group of brave and skilled seafarers would row to sea to meet arriving cargo sailing ships. These daring individuals would use their extensive local knowledge to safely guide the sailing ships across the treacherous sand bars that guarded the river entrance. This was the origin of the St. Johns Bar Pilots. Initially it was a bit of a...

Crude Oil Tanker British Robin passing St Anns Head on a rather windy day in Pembrokeshire.

Here we board the container ship President Kennedy, inbound for the San Francisco Bay.
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Another accident was reported on YouTube on Feb. 3rd 2020 by akif pradias.
"This video shown how's hwalein pilot got accident while boarding the vessel, its teach us to be more carefully during pilot transfer..."