Looking for a Ship (7 page)
Read Looking for a Ship Online
Authors: John McPhee
Tell it to the ship.
Now sixty-five years old, the captain began as an ordinary seaman in a Merchant Marine of fewer than a thousand ships and saw it rise above two thousand ships and then decline by eighty per cent. He has seen at least fifteen American shipping companies go ventral in the water. Only three major ones remain alive in international shipping: American President Lines, Sea-Land, and Lykes Brothers Steamship Company. Ship for ship, crew lists have become much shorter as wellâa process known as reduced manning, which is the result of a combination of automational technology and economic constraint. Ships that might once have had fifty in the crew now have twenty-one. Some ships are so undermanned that extra people have to come out from land to help dock them.
From No. 1 in the world in total ships, the United States Merchant Marine has dropped to No. 13, while Panama and Russia are ascendant, with Liberia not far behind. In the world competition for cargo, American-flag companies sail under heavy overheads of taxes, insurance rates, and crew costs, while ships under other flags are much less encumbered, and the Russian Merchant Marine, which often underbids everybody, is a hobby of the state. The wages of American crews are at least four times as high as the wages of crews sailing under many foreign flags. Federal construction subsidies have long since been removed. These
are not the economics of a winning bid, and the fleet continues to shrink.
are not the economics of a winning bid, and the fleet continues to shrink.
The situation long ago gave rise to open-flag registry âto the so-called flag of convenience, the convenience being that taxes could be avoided, insurance could be to a considerable extent ignored, and wages attractive to shipowners could be paid to merchant sailors drawn from any part of the world, if ships were registered in countries that would permit and fashion such a package. If you were a flagmaker, at this point you would have wanted to get out your Panamanian rectangles. As small nations catered to the balance sheets of alien shipowners, their services became known as boutique registries. Evergreen, flying the white star of Taiwan, has been described as “the leading foreign-flag company in the world,” with crews of only sixteen or eighteen and “monthly salaries roughly equivalent to the weekly pay of American sailors.” You can register a ship in the Republic of Vanuatu. A ship wholly owned in Kansas City can sail under the flag of the Sultan of Oman.
Carnival Cruise Lines, of Miami, Florida, consists of three ships under the Liberian flag, one under the Bahamian flag, four under the Panamanian flag, and three under the Dutch flag. Great American Lines, recently bankrupt, was a hundred per cent Liberian. Great American Lines had one ship. The Connecticut Bank & Trust Company owns two ships, both Liberian. Exxon has sixty-two ships, under ten flags, including eight under the Argentine gold sun, five under the French tricolor, and twenty flying the Union Jack, which has become a flag of convenience as Britain
sells the waves. The Amoco fleet is entirely Liberian. The Chevron fleet is twenty per cent American, nine per cent British, fifteen per cent Bahamian, and fifty-six per cent Liberian. Texaco has thirteen ships, none flying the American flag. Mobil has thirty-six ships under seven flags, including the flag of South Africa.
sells the waves. The Amoco fleet is entirely Liberian. The Chevron fleet is twenty per cent American, nine per cent British, fifteen per cent Bahamian, and fifty-six per cent Liberian. Texaco has thirteen ships, none flying the American flag. Mobil has thirty-six ships under seven flags, including the flag of South Africa.
Three hundred and forty-one ships owned by Americans sail under foreign flags. Some of the owners patriotically refer to these ships as the Effective U.S.-Controlled Fleet, a term regarded as a risible euphemism by, among other people, the maritime unions and Captain Washburn. In his words, “a ship owned in Chicago, with a Burmese crew and Spanish officers, will not go where you want it to in an emergency.”
The crew of Stella mutters:
“Lykes Brothers could go foreign-flag like the rest of them, and sail with Balearic Islanders.”
“You can hire people to chip paint and fill an oilcan, but who's going to rebuild a Westinghouse turbogenerator?”
“We can't compete with countries that pay sailors one dollar a day and feed them fish heads and rice.”
The United States has not been the only loser in the international competition. As cargo rates have fallen below levels at which companies can operate profitably, a revolution has occurred in the merchant marines of the once preeminent maritime nations. They have been forced to “flag it out.” Norway has accomplished this by creating its own foreign flagâthe so-called Norwegian International Flagâand giving up the tradition of the all-Norwegian crew
in favor of alien sailors. As a Norwegian-ship manager has explained to me, “maybe the master, the chief engineer, and the chief mate are retained, and paid ten to fifteen per cent less than before, but the rest are gone, they are running laundromats, they have been replaced by Far Eastern officers and crew, the pay and fringes were too much.” Sweden, whose shipyards once ranked second in the world, has ceased to build oceangoing ships. All through Scandinavia, safety-training schools are empty.
in favor of alien sailors. As a Norwegian-ship manager has explained to me, “maybe the master, the chief engineer, and the chief mate are retained, and paid ten to fifteen per cent less than before, but the rest are gone, they are running laundromats, they have been replaced by Far Eastern officers and crew, the pay and fringes were too much.” Sweden, whose shipyards once ranked second in the world, has ceased to build oceangoing ships. All through Scandinavia, safety-training schools are empty.
Because flag-of-convenience ships are essentially unregulated, they have led a trend toward compromised safety and the lowest practicable levels of operation and maintenance. Dragging others down with them, they have crowded into a genre previously reserved for Greeks and Haitians. As viewed from the wheelhouses of the American Merchant Marine, the butts of jokesâthe oafs of the oceansâhave long been the Greeks and the Haitians: unseaworthy-sailors-let-loose-in-unseaworthy-ships sort of thing, the worst on water, ship handlers of such negligible skill that one ought to cede them wider clearance than anyone else in the world with the exception of the United States Coast Guard. So go the stories. If there was any distinction, the Haitians had the worst vessels, the Greeks the worst sailors. In Vernon McLaughlin's words, “Greeks are known throughout the world as very bad seamen.” Captain Washburn recently watched the Haitian vessel In God We Trust going out of Miami in a condition not likely to attract much confidence from any other Source. “Haitian ships have no electricity, no electronic instruments,” he says. “No fish, no food. They
load beyond capacity, and off they sail. More than two hundred ships a year are lost out here, all flags. They're unseaworthy, they're improperly loaded, they have leaking hatches, metal fatigue. In God We Trust was never heard from again.”
load beyond capacity, and off they sail. More than two hundred ships a year are lost out here, all flags. They're unseaworthy, they're improperly loaded, they have leaking hatches, metal fatigue. In God We Trust was never heard from again.”
He continues, “A lot of us who have put our lives into this thing don't want to see the Merchant Marine die: It is not only worthwhile but necessary. Every hundred million the government has pulled out of Merchant Marine subsidies has probably cost billions in mounting trade deficits. We pay other flags, including Russia, millions of dollars to deliver our foreign aid: rice, flour, vegetable oil, powdered milk, tanks, jeeps. By law, fifty per cent is supposed to go on American ships, but we don't have the bottoms. Some years, we carry five per cent. Even so, our shipping companies are more dependent on our foreign aid than the foreigners we aid. We have not only one of the smallest but also one of the most aged merchant marines. Most of our ships are beyond their normal life expectancy. American shipyards have been folding, and their skills with them. The shipyards that remain are essentially repair yardsâBath, Newport News, Chester, Pascagoula. That's it. That's all she wrote, hoss.”
While the United States Merchant Marine and the merchant marines of all the traditional maritime nations have struggled to compete with boutique flags and remain economically under way, the expanding competitiveness of the Soviet Union has not eased anyone's burden. The Soviet Union long ago decided that one good way to be much
involved in the world's activities is to carry the goods. Ninety-five per cent of the world's freight travels on the sea. Annually, the Russian Merchant Marine carries fifty times as much cargo as the United States Merchant Marine. The Soviet Union has been spending about two and a half billion dollars a year on shipping development. It has bought many trade routes, and it is building so many ships that it may soon be ordering them from Western yards. It is so eager for business that it has planned to test an ice-strengthened freighter that could cross the Arctic Ocean hauling lead and zinc from Alaska to smelters in West Germanyâall to save one week, shortcutting the alternative route, through the Panama Canal. “Russia is going to have five thousand merchant ships in ten years,” Washburn says. “And we are going to have noneâenn, oh, enn, ee, as in not any.”
involved in the world's activities is to carry the goods. Ninety-five per cent of the world's freight travels on the sea. Annually, the Russian Merchant Marine carries fifty times as much cargo as the United States Merchant Marine. The Soviet Union has been spending about two and a half billion dollars a year on shipping development. It has bought many trade routes, and it is building so many ships that it may soon be ordering them from Western yards. It is so eager for business that it has planned to test an ice-strengthened freighter that could cross the Arctic Ocean hauling lead and zinc from Alaska to smelters in West Germanyâall to save one week, shortcutting the alternative route, through the Panama Canal. “Russia is going to have five thousand merchant ships in ten years,” Washburn says. “And we are going to have noneâenn, oh, enn, ee, as in not any.”
He remembers when F-14 fighter engines travelled to Israel in Russian ships, it being cheaper that way. The Russians give good weight. Not only were the F-14 engines “defense sensitive”âthat is to say, classifiedâthey were by law supposed to go in American bottoms. But what American bottoms? The Russians, on a routine basis, run a couple of hundred ships in and out of American portsâmore than half as many ships as there are in the entire United States Merchant Marine. A story that Washburn savors less than some others involves the importation of chrome, and its crucial importance to United States industries. The chrome came from the part of Rhodesia that is now Zimbabwe. When, for moral reasons, the United States government imposed economic sanctions against Rhodesia, American
business executives made of moral coral were obliged to figure out how to circumvent the sanctions. It was not a great problem. For a three-hundred-per-cent premium, Russians showed up with the chrome.
business executives made of moral coral were obliged to figure out how to circumvent the sanctions. It was not a great problem. For a three-hundred-per-cent premium, Russians showed up with the chrome.
In the warm flows of amity that now connect the two nations, Washburn is an ice cube. “The ocean is one more country to take over,” he says. “They may have had trouble taking over Afghanistan, but they're having no trouble taking over this ocean. They go to an international conference on freight rates and sign an accord agreeing to a rate of, say, eighty-two dollars a ton; then, immediately, they offer space for thirty-seven dollars, or whatever. Same song, second verse.
He also says that a typical Russian merchant ship has at least two naval-trained officers, a K.G.B. man, and a commissar who runs the ship, telling the captain what to do.
Not long ago, a sailboat on Lake Michigan capsized in a storm and the crew spent seven hours clinging to the hull. They were rescued by a Russian merchant ship.
I
f Dirty Shirt George Price had a shipful of starving horses, what would Dirty Shirt do? If they threw this at Dirty Shirt, what would he do? Captain Washburn found an answer. He sent word to the galley that he wanted all the corn, cereal, bread, and other foodstuffs that the cook could possibly spare. Toward noon, when the cook had got it all together, the captain asked me to find Carlos and bring him to the bridge. I went to Hatch 4, Bay 1, where Carlos was offering the horses generous amounts of water, and accompanied him to the bridge. The captain, with obvious pleasure, asked me to tell Carlos that he had set aside for the horses a hundred and twenty ears of corn.
f Dirty Shirt George Price had a shipful of starving horses, what would Dirty Shirt do? If they threw this at Dirty Shirt, what would he do? Captain Washburn found an answer. He sent word to the galley that he wanted all the corn, cereal, bread, and other foodstuffs that the cook could possibly spare. Toward noon, when the cook had got it all together, the captain asked me to find Carlos and bring him to the bridge. I went to Hatch 4, Bay 1, where Carlos was offering the horses generous amounts of water, and accompanied him to the bridge. The captain, with obvious pleasure, asked me to tell Carlos that he had set aside for the horses a hundred and twenty ears of corn.
Understand, I am by no means fluent. I have a fairly good Spanish vocabulary, an ear that seems to reject incoming Spanish sound, and grammar tartare. The pleasure in my voice must have been clear enough, though, as I told Carlos about the corn.
Carlos said that racehorses do not eat cornânot
his
racehorses, anyway. Absolutely, they were not to be given corn.
his
racehorses, anyway. Absolutely, they were not to be given corn.
While the helmsman listened and the chief mate listened, I repeated this to Captain Washburn.
The captain's demeanor changed. In brusque staccato, he said, “Tell him to be my guest, then, if the horses prefer wood.” Becoming even more sarcastic, he continued, “Tell him I'm sorry I don't have barley or oats.”
I said that the captain had no other grains.
Carlos said that the captain needn't worry. The horses were not to be given other grains.
I told Carlos that the captain was sorry.
Carlos said, in English, “No problem.” In Spanish he said to tell the captain that everything would be all right if we arrived on schedule in the morning. Was the captain quite certain that we would arrive in the morning?
Washburn said, “Tell him I can't say whether we will arrive at seven-fifty-five or eight.”
Carlos remarked that by morning he would have one packet of hay left, which he would reserve for Dr. Sab.
To the captain I said, “Carlos feels confident that he can make it on one bale of hay and two cords of wood.”
The captain said, “To each his own. Tell him I will no longer attempt to project myself into his business. Tell him I'm going to throw the corn over the side. Tell him I once had a rhinoceros on board.”
Carlos said, “The captain has much experience.”
Carlos went back to Hatch 4. When I saw him there
a short time later, his hands were purple with gentian, and he was nursing a wound. In the wind, pieces of his trousers flapped like flags. Inside a container, he had been climbing from one stall to another when a two-year-old bit him in the crotch.
a short time later, his hands were purple with gentian, and he was nursing a wound. In the wind, pieces of his trousers flapped like flags. Inside a container, he had been climbing from one stall to another when a two-year-old bit him in the crotch.
Sometimes I go on lookout with Peewee, Mac, or Calvinâgo forward with a flashlight on the main deck at four, up the ladder to the fo'c'sle deck, around the windlasses and the anchor chains, and past the hawsepipes to the absolute point of the bow, where the lookout station conforms to the requirements of admiralty court, being “as far forward and as low down as conditions allow.” The lookout stands in a roofless cupboard. A sheet of clear plastic deflects the wind. He is not quite like a fly on a bowsprit, but somewhere near itâprojected far over the water, over the nose bulb, and riding up and down the Pacific swells. He stands there, and stays there, in rain and lightning. He is transferred to a bridge wing if the weather gets rough and he lets the mate know that “she's taking green seas.” In Peewee's words, “When we're taking sprays over the bow, taking seas up here, we go to the wing. It don't happen too much on this run. This run mostly calm all the time.” The lookout reports the ships he sees, describing what has long since appeared on the radar. He reports wooden boats that the radar doesn't see. He looks for debris, floating objects, life rafts. We occasionally pass through a fishing fleet as if it were a cloud of gnats. Peewee says, “I report the first one and leave the rest to the mate. They all start turning on lights. There's too many to report. They fish in the dark.
Sometimes you're right up on them before they turn on their lights.” Mac remembers when the lookout rang a bell if he saw something to starboard, rang it twice if to port, and three times if an object was dead ahead. He even remembers when lookouts shouted, “Lights are bright, sir!” and the mate on the bridge shouted back, “Aye, aye!” On this ship, it would have to be some shout. The distance from bow to bridge is four hundred feet.
Sometimes you're right up on them before they turn on their lights.” Mac remembers when the lookout rang a bell if he saw something to starboard, rang it twice if to port, and three times if an object was dead ahead. He even remembers when lookouts shouted, “Lights are bright, sir!” and the mate on the bridge shouted back, “Aye, aye!” On this ship, it would have to be some shout. The distance from bow to bridge is four hundred feet.
The A.B.s stand the first hourâMac on odd-numbered days. Then Peewee the ordinary takes over and remains through dawn. One odd-numbered night with no stars, Mac said he could not care less about the clouds of the Pacific and their harmless rainsâhe was just happy that this was not a run to North Europe. He said, “That run is never good. It is foggy in the summer; rough, cold, damp, and miserable in the winter.” Sometimes in the winter North Atlantic, lookouts are posted around the clock.
At ten minutes to five, Peewee came on, and he also told lookout stories about the North Atlantic, which were summed up in one remark: “You can't see nothing. You just listen.” Here, in the breaking dawns, he sees whales and porpoises and schools of tuna. Peewee was a house-painter before he went to sea. In Savannah, he has seven children and a number of grandchildren. He has been shipping out for thirty-five years. I asked him why.
“You make a good living. I just come and make my little time and go back.” His sea time last year was six months. He made thirty thousand dollars. In Savannah, if the pay is acceptable, he will still occasionally paint. Not
long ago, he painted a parachute tower at the Army airfield. He made seven hundred dollars a weekâonly a little more than half of what he earns at sea. Working high in the parachute tower reminded him of painting the masts of ships. For the most part in Savannah, he enjoys himself and works at nothing. He drives his Lincoln, and he pesters Ethel Kennedy. Soon he will retire.
long ago, he painted a parachute tower at the Army airfield. He made seven hundred dollars a weekâonly a little more than half of what he earns at sea. Working high in the parachute tower reminded him of painting the masts of ships. For the most part in Savannah, he enjoys himself and works at nothing. He drives his Lincoln, and he pesters Ethel Kennedy. Soon he will retire.
“Will you miss being out here?”
“Oh, no. I'll miss the money, but that's it. If I want to see ships, I'll go to the waterfront. But I don't want to see them.”
Our ports of call do not interest him. In fact, they frighten him. “In Valpo, they cut the third mate's pocket right out to get his money,” he told me. “If you go to the bank to change money, they be watching you. In Valpo, when I finish at eight o'clock at night I just go to bed.”
“What do you think about while you're up here on lookout?”
“I think about what I'd be doing if I wasn't here. I'd be partying. It's Sunday morning. I'd just be getting home by now. I don't drink anymore. I eat too many eggs. I had to stop drinking when I got the 'lesterol.”
Peewee said he remembered being on lookout in the North Atlantic when there were “icebergs all around.” He said, “They looked like diamonds in the night.” He was in waters off Greenland on a tanker that carried jet fuel and discharged it at anchor after divers went into the water and brought up the ends of pipelines. As the ship approached the anchorage through fields of icebergs, there were lookouts
with binoculars on both bridge wings. An icebreaker led the way. The ship hit no ice going in, but while she was at anchor ice hit the ship. Twenty-seven plates cracked.
with binoculars on both bridge wings. An icebreaker led the way. The ship hit no ice going in, but while she was at anchor ice hit the ship. Twenty-seven plates cracked.
The light came upâa gray Pacific dawn. Peewee materialized: a slight figure in a construction worker's leather boots, paint-spattered dungarees, a khaki wool shirt, and a baseball cap numbered 117âhis daughter Louvenia's unit in the Air Force. Toward six-thirty, he said, “Should be time for sunset?”
“Sunset?”
“Yes. At sunset, that's when the mate calls you to knock off the lookout. Four-to-eight watch. I see the sun go down. I see the sun rise.” Minutes went by, the gray became brighter, and still Andy did not call. At 06:41:36, the telephone rang in the bow. Andy said to Peewee, “Good morning. This is the equator.”
Andy drops money on the equator. I wondered how much he was dropping on it now. I imagined myself throwing money on the equator, and shivered at the thought.
I also shivered in the cool of the morning. At noon that day, one degree south, the Fahrenheit temperature was seventy-eight degrees, the relative humidity seventy-five per cent. At noon that day in New York City, I learned later, the temperature was eighty-five and climbing. The day's high humidity was ninety-one per cent. All through the summer, everybody in New York and its perisphere had been living in the sort of climate that seals the skin and pops veins in the head: They waded in humidity. Every day for weeks, the high temperatures remained between
eighty-eight and ninety-seven. Before I shipped out, I met a Liberian who had come to Princeton on a fellowship. I asked him if he liked America. He said, “Everything but the heat. It is intolerable. Never in my country have I experienced such heat.” By comparison with New York, Panama was cool. The canal, creeping through the forest, was cool. The evening we left Panama, the temperature in the North Pacific was in the seventies. The weather was almost unnerving. As soon as Stella crossed the equator, you heard people say, “It's winter now”âa technicality that is not persuasive there at the latitude of Borneo, with the hull's velvet slide over that soft ocean. We entered the Gulf of Guayaquil. Just the sound of that nameâGuayaquilâspelled coffee and chocolate to me, spelled mangoes, bananas, guavas, and heat. At four that afternoon, though, when the temperature in New York City was eighty-nine, the temperature in the Gulf of Guayaquil was seventy-five. I finally understood where the tropics are, why the nights of the iguana are on Forty-seventh Street, and Broadway steams with rain.
eighty-eight and ninety-seven. Before I shipped out, I met a Liberian who had come to Princeton on a fellowship. I asked him if he liked America. He said, “Everything but the heat. It is intolerable. Never in my country have I experienced such heat.” By comparison with New York, Panama was cool. The canal, creeping through the forest, was cool. The evening we left Panama, the temperature in the North Pacific was in the seventies. The weather was almost unnerving. As soon as Stella crossed the equator, you heard people say, “It's winter now”âa technicality that is not persuasive there at the latitude of Borneo, with the hull's velvet slide over that soft ocean. We entered the Gulf of Guayaquil. Just the sound of that nameâGuayaquilâspelled coffee and chocolate to me, spelled mangoes, bananas, guavas, and heat. At four that afternoon, though, when the temperature in New York City was eighty-nine, the temperature in the Gulf of Guayaquil was seventy-five. I finally understood where the tropics are, why the nights of the iguana are on Forty-seventh Street, and Broadway steams with rain.
The captain said, “Bring her over smartlyâzero-seven-five.”
Calvin, at the wheel, said, “Zero-seven-five.”
The mouth of the River Guayas is defended by a bedrock ledge, which at mean low water lies a few inches deeper than the keel of the Stella Lykes. Gingerly as she goes, every judgment must be perfect above the bar. (“We've been aground twice here,” said the bosun.) The emerging current sweeps across the bar. There are large, powerful eddies.
“You slow down in here, she really goes sideways, she really goes like a crab,” the captain said. “I watched her set down on this buoy here just to see how far she'd go. Zero-seven-three.”
Calvin: “Zero-seven-three.”
Andy said, “I see an impressive current on the buoy.” The turbulence downcurrent from the buoy resembled the wake of a ship.
Our speed was reduced to ten knots. Burgos the river pilot, who had come aboard, wanted dead slow. Not on this ship in these waters, the captain said. “On dead slow, she doesn't steer. They made the ship a hundred and fifteen feet longer and they didn't change the rudder. You have to play high water here to come over this bar.”
He played high water. Like a slaloming kayak, he came over the bar. The Fathometer, lacking the sophistication of a slide calliper, showed no discernible gap between the bottom of the hull and the top of the rock.
Captain Washburn said, “So far so mundane.”
A wrecked stick ship lay before us in the mouth of the riverâits hull canted, half submerged, its booms at gruesome angles in the air. “See that ship dead ahead?” Washburn said. “He shouldn't have gone there, on account of he's there forever.”
As we entered the continentâto run forty miles upriver in the drainage due west of the Amazonâthe temperature at 7 P.M. was seventy degrees. The sailors were wearing jackets and sweaters. It was the most refreshing air I had felt in two monthsâin a country named for the equator.
“The river current on the ebb tide, she comes out of there pretty good,” Washburn said. “It's hell if you sheer off a thing and hell if you suck into it.” As the propeller pulls water from under a ship, the ship goes down a little in the stern. “Going over the bar, we were down by the stern by fourteen inches. Here in the river, she is also smelling the bottom. She'll suck toward whatever you want to stay away fromâa hump or the bank. A ship sucks into a bank or sheers off a bank. One way or the other,
something
is going to happen. Depending on the depth of the water, the horsepower, the tide, the currents, the unconformity of the bottom, she'll suck in or sheer off if she builds up a wave of water. On this river, if you're the man at the wheel you can't be learning on the job. You have to sense that sucker's going to move and put that corrected wheel on then, before it moves, or you're zigzagging all over the place and every time you chase that sheer around you're making it worse. There's some guys that have been steering all their lives and have no instinct for it and can't do it anyway. In a place like this, a good quartermaster is worth his weight in gold.”
something
is going to happen. Depending on the depth of the water, the horsepower, the tide, the currents, the unconformity of the bottom, she'll suck in or sheer off if she builds up a wave of water. On this river, if you're the man at the wheel you can't be learning on the job. You have to sense that sucker's going to move and put that corrected wheel on then, before it moves, or you're zigzagging all over the place and every time you chase that sheer around you're making it worse. There's some guys that have been steering all their lives and have no instinct for it and can't do it anyway. In a place like this, a good quartermaster is worth his weight in gold.”
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