Oh, a Sailor’s Life

by

Help Wanted:

• Starting pay about $41,000 and, after first upgrade (usually within a year) about $65,000.

• Eight months work: Four months on the job/two months off;

• Full medical, optical and dental benefits with no employee contribution;

• While on the job, all meals and room provided;

• Retirement pension paid fully by employer;

• Training provided with free tuition, room and board;

• A job, and regular advancements, guaranteed after training.

If these are the job benefits, one has to wonder why is it so hard to fill all the open positions within the maritime industry.

Bart Rogers, assistant vice president of the Seafarers International Union’s Paul Hall Center, believes the applicant hesitation all comes down to three little words: “Must leave home.”

“Half my life has been telling people what a wonderful opportunity this is,” Bart says. “I have more jobs than I do people.”

But those people must be interested, ane perhaps even excited by, a job that’s always on the move. “You have to leave home,” Bart says. “You can’t really move cargo without a ship.”

Coming up through the hawsepipe, as it’s called in the maritime industry when someone starts from the ground up in their maritime career, has never had more perks than today.

Those wishing to pursue an unlicensed apprentice program (aka the hawsepiper program) could enter into a union run program, such as through the International Organization of Masters, Mates & Pilots or at the Seafarers International Union’s (SIU) vocational training at the Seafarers Harry Lundeberg School of Seamanship in Piney Point, Maryland.

In the SIU program, the school does not charge tuition and provides room and board for accepted students, though they are responsible for buying their uniforms and for the cost of a physical exam, drug and benzene tests, and the required U.S. Merchant Mariner’s Credential, a Transportation Workers Identification Credential and a current passport – putting the cost of the program at about $1,500. Lest you forget that the work will be physically demanding, the initial evaluation also accesses an applicant’s physical abilities from ladder climbing to load lifting (at least 40 pounds) and the ability to “crouch, kneel, crawl, and stand on your feet for extended periods.”

Training for a deck or engine department position follows five phases at the school and takes a little more than a year: 15 weeks in the classroom in general shipboard and safety training; 90 days on a ship; seven weeks back at school for training in a specific department of your choice; 120 days on a ship in that department as entry-level crew; and final completion of department-specific training.

In the steward department (mostly cooks), the program also takes about a year.

“This opportunity presents other opportunities – without debt – like no other,” Bart says.

While many of the school’s students may be not long out of high school, others are in their 40s looking to start a new career, or out of college looking to pay of debts more quickly.

“I have a bigger influx of college graduates into my program,” Bart says. Because workers do not pay for food or lodging while on the ship, they can save more of their wages, he points out. He’s known of workers able to save up to $100,000 in just five years.

“It literally costs you nothing to go to work, save money and come home – four months on, two months off,” he says.

That maritime jobs are ripe for the taking is no secret. All of the major fleets on the Great Lakes have put a priority on recruiting. Industry representatives like the Chamber of Marine Commerce in Ottawa, Ontario, and the Lake Carriers’ Association, feature online links to view job postings or help navigate the first steps toward becoming a merchant marine.

For example, in the United States, the law requires everyone on a U.S.-flagged commercial vessel to have a Merchant Mariner’s Credential (MMC) and Transportation Workers Identification Credential (TWIC) Card from the U.S. Coast Guard.

There are three basic areas of a ship needing unlicensed workers, described on the Lake Carriers’ Association website. These departments also have licensed positions.

The deck department mainly is concerned with “maintenance of areas and equipment, docking and undocking, handling lines, operating machinery and lifesaving equipment and standing watch in the wheelhouse, provided watchkeeping exams are completed.”

The engine department offers many positions, depending on ratings a worker has achieved through work experience or via training.

In the engine room, these include oiler, mechanical assistant, junior engineer, fireman, deck engine mechanic, engineman, pumpman, electrician, machinist, conveyorman, and refrigerator engineer. In the United States, but not Canada, there is an entry level position in the engine room called a wiper. “A wiper typically does general maintenance and cleaning work and assists engineers in their tasks,” according to the LCA website.

The third area for unlicensed workers is the steward department, mainly concerned with food preparation.

Bart says this area particularly needs workers, and a chief cook can make $8,000 to 10,000 a month with full benefits.

In terms of the current maritime workforce, Bart says racial and ethnic diversity is the norm.

“This is the biggest melting pot of people you’ll find anywhere,” he says of the maritime industry.

Unfortunately, that melting pot now is heavily weighted toward men.

Bart estimates only 10 percent of the U.S. merchant marine workforce includes women.

“Women don’t gravitate to us,” Bart says. That might be because of the long times away from home, which can make starting a family with children difficult.

The Chamber of Marine Commerce notes the same issues in the Canadian and international maritime workforce.

It issued stories for the International Day of the Seafarer in June that focused on women working on the ships and pointed out that only 2 percent of the world’s 1.2 million seafarers are women.

This year, the United Nations’ International Maritime Organization chose “I am on Board with Gender Equality” as the theme of the seafarer day.

In one of the chamber’s stories, 4th Engineer Cassandra Richie talked about being the only woman on the Algoma Conveyor and encouraged other women to follow that career path. “I would say just go for it,” she says. “People that I’ve worked with have been so supportive and encouraging. I know that other women could do it as well.”

Cassandra’s job entails monitoring the operation of the engine rooms while on watch, plus maintaining the pumps in the engine room, deck cranes and other equipment, cabin and galley equipment, the marine sanitation device and incinerator.

She says those visiting her work place are much impressed.

“Everything is so big. The engine room is four stories below the waterline, people are always amazed when they see it. I just love this job.  It’s not just a job, it’s a way of life. You work, you sleep, you live, you make friends.”

For Cassandra, the lack of women in the maritime workforce might be a matter of perception as much as of expected performance. Seeing women in those roles will help.

“It’s not really talked about that much. You don’t see women captains in Hollywood films or other cultural references – marine shipping has been depicted as a male industry. But that’s starting to change. I was just reading the other day about the first Canadian woman to become a captain of a major cruise ship operator. I think the more women are exposed to other women working in this industry, the more they will see the opportunity for themselves.”

For herself, Cassandra told the chamber that she takes full advantage of the four to five months off work she has every year.

“I do a lot of travelling. This winter I was in Las Vegas, then Africa where I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, and then I spent several weeks visiting friends in Australia. Last year, my boyfriend and I went to Peru to see Machu Picchu.”

One hurdle to recruiting men or women into the profession, Bart admits, is first getting them to think about the ships as a job. Often people don’t even realize how critical those freighters crossing the oceans and Great Lakes are to their everyday lives.

“They think this stuff shows up in the stores by airplane,” he says, adding. “People generally don’t see the maritime field as a viable career choice” or may confuse the merchant marine with military service.

They also likely don’t realize the range of jobs available. Besides the workers on the freighters, such as deckhands and cooks, the Seafarers International Union also recruits for a cruise ship service, including on-board nurses.

“The lack of knowledge that people have about maritime opportunities,” Bart says, is another of the challenges.

The other unusual workplace reality for maritime unions like the SIU, is that they actually encourage their trainees and their union members who want to advance through the hawsepipe to become officers, which means they ultimately may leave the union.

“We encourage the hawsepiping,” Bart says. “We preach hawsepipers.”

A Hawsepipe Story

Ken Gerasimos, general manager of the Great Lakes Fleet based in Duluth, started his way through the hawsepipe and his maritime career just after high school in Trenton, Michigan.

It came as no surprise that the maritime industry would be Ken’s career choice. His father became a Great Lakes captain in his early 30s, a young age for the position. What was a surprise to Ken at the time was that he’d be dropped off at ground zero to start that career.

After high school, he asked his dad for help with college tuition. “He dropped me off at the Coast Guard (to get his credentials),” Ken recalls with a

chuckle, “and told me to take the bus to the union hall. Best thing he could have ever done!”

His certification in order and union membership secured, he shipped out on the William Clay Ford as a deckhand and later moved to the Henry Ford II, the vessel his dad commanded. “He was always tough,” Ken says of his captain father, “but he’d hold the boat if a crewmember was missing … unless it was me.” And, Ken admits, there were a few times he “missed the boat” by arriving too late. Luckily, the Henry Ford II, under the service of the Ford Motor Company, worked on the lower river ports and so catching it at the next port wasn’t too hard. The same would not be true if your boat left you in Duluth … with the next stop the Soo Locks, Ken notes.

Among his various positions along the pipe, Ken served in the engine and deck departments and worked his way to 3rd mate on all five of the Ford company’s freighters. He was the last 3rd mate on the original Benson Ford prior to its decommissioning.

In the wheelhouse, where the navigation of the ship takes place, is where you prepare for taking those next steps up to 2nd and 1st mate and finally to captain, Ken suggests. “You should have eight years in the wheelhouse … so that you can witness things going wrong and what you have to do to correct it.”

These days in his general manager position, Ken seems tied more to the phone than that famous anchor chain and its hawespipe. He now directs, assigns and tracks the fleet’s vessels, but remains nostalgic for the early days and his 20-plus years aboard a ship.

“The stuff you will see out there; you’ll see stars you will never see otherwise.” He recalls one day when the sun’s rays seemed to bounce from the water of Lake Superior, smooth as glass, up to the sky above Pictured Rocks in Michigan. “You had to be in the perfect spot in the universe,” he says, “and it was just so amazing to see that.”

Just What is a Hawsepipe?

The common maritime phrase for coming up through the ranks from an unlicensed seaman position to a licensed officer post is called “coming up through the hawsepipe” and merchant marines who do that are called “hawsepipers.” But just what is a hawsepipe?

The hawsepipe is the cast iron or steel pipe or opening through which the anchor chain passes.

As to the future of “hawsepipers,” it is admittedly not becoming easier to advance through the ranks without the benefit of formal officer education, such as at a maritime academy, and some say that recent regulations regarding merchant marine licensure and documentation make the task more daunting and narrow that hawsepipe hole. That said, coming up through the ranks and self-studying for the U.S. Coast Guard license does still remain possible for those committed to that path.

In the Pipeline or at the Academy?

If you are considering a maritime career and want a fast track to a licensed officer position, a formal maritime academy may be the right choice for you.

The U.S. has seven accredited academies with only the Great Lakes Maritime Academy (GLMA) in Traverse City, Michigan, based on the Great Lakes (www.nmc.edu/maritime).

Canada has eight, including Georgian College’s Centre for Marine Training and Research in Owen Sound, Ontario on Lake Huron (www.georgiancollege.ca).

Whether you are considering the hawsepipe or the academy, two helpful starting points for those in Canada or the United States are on the websites of the Lake Carriers’ Assocation (www.lcaships.com) and the Chamber of Marine Commerce (www.marinedelivers.com).