A conversation about the Jones Act

Article originally published in SWZ|Maritime September 2022

Through the years, the Dutch Pilots have developed a system of selection, initial education and continual professional training. What is the current state of affairs?

Many people wonder how ships made it across entire oceans without getting lost in the seventeenth century. Aaron introduces seventeenth century navigation to us today by beginning with piloting.

Over the past few years a number of pilot transfer accidents have occurred resulting from total failure of the side ropes, one school of thought is that the methods of securing a pilot ladder is a factor in such occurrences.

What happens when GNSS fails? In maritime navigation, this isn’t a hypothetical scenario – it’s a growing risk. Spoofing, jamming, and GNSS outages are increasing, especially in the Baltic Sea region. A failure can cripple navigation systems – with potentially serious consequences.

Of course, as a Nautical Specialist, I also deal with the international discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of satellite-based navigation, e-navigation and conventional terrestrial and astronomical navigation.

Port Everglades Pilot Carl Mahler boarding the Submarine USS New Hampshire SSN 778 in rough weather.

The Viking Mars is a brand new cruise ship, built this year (2022). While it is a relatively small ship when it comes to cruise liners, it's still an imposing vessel. It's big enough to enable them to fit a planetarium, fitness center, hair salon, a spa, and the usual shops, restaurants and cabins. We have filmed quite a few vessels coming in and out of Holyhead port now, and the Viking Cruise Line ships are, without doubt, some of the most classy and good looking vessels about. Lovely...

#MaidenVoyage #HMMalgeciras
The maiden voyage of HMM Algeciras #9-Hamburg: The largest containership in the world, HMM Algeciras, navigates 110km up to the Elbe River to Hamburg's HHLA CTB Terminal on 7 June 2020 - Welcome to Germany!

As a part of the ISTLAB project the impact of external factors on pilots’ activities in a remote pilotage situation has been examined in Rauma.