Holland America Blog
Safety Officer
Holland America Blog Has Just Posted the Following:
During the night it was rather breezy, to use an understatement, with a few moments of storm force winds blowing around the ship. *That translated into a very windy arrival as well. However Iraklion has the wind either straight from the North (Etesian winds) or straight from the South (Sahara winds) and thus the docks are lined up North to South to make the docking as easy as possible. As long as you can make the swing safely in the port, from an East/West heading to a North/South one, as the docks are perpendicular onto the entrance of the port, you are in good shape. When you get the nose or the stern into the wind then the ship does not drift anymore and you can park easily and safely alongside the dock. And so we did. But as the dock space was fully open to these Northerly winds barreling in, our guests had a challenge to walk to the Gate. Security did not allow any taxi’s on the dock and there weren’t any golf carts or other mobiles to help with transport. I was able to observe the interesting phenomena of ———-Rollator Against the Wind———-. I felt sorry for the guests but on the other hand, this would have figured greatly in a Marx Brothers movie. I also had to lean against the wind pulling a suitcase as my Lord and Master descended today on the ship and she will be sailing with me until Istanbul 9 days from now. We have our objectives nicely divided, she goes sightseeing and shopping and I go to work. That work took me today by starting to walking around the ship checking where my help can be utilized the best. Normally I take care of a mixture of training, providing training materials and updating procedures. This time an inspection element has been added to it to assist the captain. The Prinsendam is an older ship and as a result has a number of challenges with the way it has to comply with all the rules and regulations. Not that the ship does […]
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During the night it was rather breezy, to use an understatement, with a few moments of storm force winds blowing around the ship. *That translated into a very windy arrival as well. However Iraklion has the wind either straight from the North (Etesian winds) or straight from the South (Sahara winds) and thus the docks are lined up North to South to make the docking as easy as possible. As long as you can make the swing safely in the port, from an East/West heading to a North/South one, as the docks are perpendicular onto the entrance of the port, you are in good shape. When you get the nose or the stern into the wind then the ship does not drift anymore and you can park easily and safely alongside the dock. And so we did. But as the dock space was fully open to these Northerly winds barreling in, our guests had a challenge to walk to the Gate. Security did not allow any taxi’s on the dock and there weren’t any golf carts or other mobiles to help with transport. I was able to observe the interesting phenomena of ———-Rollator Against the Wind———-. I felt sorry for the guests but on the other hand, this would have figured greatly in a Marx Brothers movie. I also had to lean against the wind pulling a suitcase as my Lord and Master descended today on the ship and she will be sailing with me until Istanbul 9 days from now. We have our objectives nicely divided, she goes sightseeing and shopping and I go to work. That work took me today by starting to walking around the ship checking where my help can be utilized the best. Normally I take care of a mixture of training, providing training materials and updating procedures. This time an inspection element has been added to it to assist the captain. The Prinsendam is an older ship and as a result has a number of challenges with the way it has to comply with all the rules and regulations. Not that the ship does […]
Click here to view the article.
