Support Fired Hawaiian Chieftain Crew
Submitted on Wed, 05/23/2007 - 2:40am
The following is not an IWW campaign. It is posted in solidarity. An injury to one is an injury to all!
A few weeks ago the entire crew (including the captain and officers) of the Hawaiian Chieftain (a historic "tall ship") were fired.
The ship was grossly understaffed, lacking several licenced crew and an education coordinator. The ship's income relies on providing educational sail training programs to paying customers. The crew who were present were expected to perform multiple duties outside of their stated job descriptions. They were overworked and underpaid. They were also expected to sail with a group of new inexperienced paying trainees. This was felt to be unsafe because the ship did not have the necessary compliment of experienced crew.
Last weekend the captain decided to stand the crew down from their educational sails to focus on making necessary repairs and training the new (paying) crew.
The office/seaport did not support this action and chose to fire the captain and the crew for insubordination. The captain was the first to be fired, followed by officers and remaining crew.
Included is the letter and demands that they crew delivered to the Seaport.
Please take some time to write a letter or make a phone call in support of the crew of the Hawaiian Chieftain.
Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority (Hawaiian Chieftain and Lady Washington) Phone: 1-800-200-5239 Fax: 360-533-9384
Executive Director Les Bolton [email protected]
Volunteer Crew Coordinator/ Vessel Operations Manager Inez Wall [email protected]
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Hello All,
We, the core crew of the Hawaiian Chieftain, are writing to inform you that we wholeheartedly support Captain Michael Kellick's decision to stand down the boat from education and purser duties from May 9th-12th. We feel that the negative impacts of this decision are far outweighed by the immediate and long term benefits to both the Hawaiian Chieftain and the Gray's Harbor Seaport Authority as a whole.
This decision addresses an issue that has been on our minds for a very long time. We each have our individual viewpoints, experiences, and reasons for supporting our captain. After discussion of those reasons, we have found ourselves in agreement with the following statements:
1. The Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority has a history of under staffing and failing to plan ahead for crew rotation which continues to the present.
2. The process of compensating for missing crew members puts a heavy strain on the crew.
3. Without a full complement of officer crew, we do not function fully as a boat.
4. The recurring lack of core crew on the Hawaiian Chieftain is an immediate hazard to the boat and a long term hazard to the very stability and existence of our organization, and needs to be addressed.
5. The benefits we gain in recognizing and correcting this problem now are immediate and concrete.
6. We as a crew have set upon this course of action only because we feel we have no other recourse. We do this out of a sense of affection and care for our boat, our crew, our organization, and our mission.
In closing, we would like to state that it is not our intention to impugn the hard work and dedication of any individual or faction of the Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority. There has historically been a level of alienation and animosity between the boats and the office which we wish to do away with. Things have gotten pretty awful here on the Chieftain recently, and this is the only way we could think of to effectively express the level of dysfunction we are experiencing. Our hope is that through this action we successfully express our need for our crew recruitment practices to change. We recognize that this responsibility lies with each and every one of us. This is an organization-wide dysfunction that needs to be addressed on an organization-wide level. We as a crew commit ourselves to doing whatever is necessary to support the Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority, our boat, each other, the communities we interact with, and our mission as an organization. We regard this action as a painful and necessary step to honor those commitments.
Sincerely,
Jesse Loge, Chief Mate Elizabeth Foretek, Bosun Nick Williams, Engineer Lee Newberry, Steward Sarah Cosper, Cook
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Full explanation of above concerns:
Having made those statements, we wish for there to be no confusion as to our intentions or our reasons for supporting this action. We therefore provide the supporting logic and reasoning for each point below:
1. The Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority has a history of understaffing and failing to plan ahead for crew rotation which continues to the present.
-For the past several years, it has been regular to experience gaps in staffing between the end of one crewmember's contract and the beginning of their replacement's. It has frequently been the case that the search for a new member of the core crew has not begun until the previous crewmember has left the boat.
-Our organization also has a history of filling positions in a stopgap fashion by hiring crewmembers for two weeks or a month at a time, at which point the process begins again.
-The Hawaiian Chieftain requires eight core crew plus three deckhands to fill all positions on an education sail and allow for crewmembers to get regular days off. In the past twelve weeks, the vessel has at no time operated with all eight core crew and three or more volunteers.
-On April 15th, the Education Coordinator ended his contracted time on the vessel and left. On April 23 rd, the Purser's contract extension ended and she left. This was forseen months in advance. As of today, the Hawaiian Chieftain is still without a Purser or Education Coordinator.
2. The process of compensating for missing crewmembers puts a heavy strain on the crew.
-We do this by either dividing up the job, or asking one crewmember to pull double duty. For instance, if the Steward is missing, the Education Coordinator may handle tours and press interaction while the Purser handles ticket sales, sail bookings, and passenger interactions. Alternatively, the Purser may be assigned all Steward duties until a new Steward is hired. The decision is made based upon the position needing to be compensated for, the experience and skill level of the other crewmembers, and the length of time that the position will remain unfilled.
-Each of the core crew positions demand a considerable amount of skill and personal resources to be carried out well. They require experience, specialized training, and sustained dedication on the part of the officer. They are not lightly taken up.
-In addition to the specialized duties of the officer positions, every member of the core crew must bear a certain amount of the workload associated with the general operations of the boat. Maintenance, sail handling, teaching, public interaction and crew training constitute an enormous workload that requires a team effort to manage.
-Between the specialized and general duties, each of the core crew jobs produces enough work to keep an individual occupied for twelve hours a day, every day.
-When the crew compensates for an unfilled position, each individual crewmember must necessarily choose between fulfilling every task given to them or caring for themselves. For instance, an Education Coordinator who is filling in for the Purser must spend a certain amount of time after evening muster doing the paperwork associated with both positions instead of taking a shower or doing laundry.
-By putting their personal needs on hold, a crew can compensate for an unfilled position for brief periods of time. After a period of weeks or even months, however, individual crewmembers begin to burn out as the effects of their self-neglect become apparent. Crewmembers become visibly weary, pessimistic in their outlook, cynical in their opinions, unkempt in their personal effects. A crewmember with a significant work related injury may have to fulfill sail handling duties instead of convalescing, because there was is crewmember left to cover for them.
-Eventually burned out crewmembers leave the boat feeling badly about the Gray's Harbor organization as a whole, and speak badly of it on other boats. This diminishes our reputation and hurts our organization in the long run.
3. Without a full complement of officer crew, we do not function fully as a boat.
-While compensating for an unfilled position, crewmembers are also forced to choose between fulfilling their contracted duties and fulfilling their temporary duties. For instance, an Engineer who is also Mate must choose between organizing the crew in their daily routine and changing oil filters on schedule.
-Each officer will prioritize their duties and choose the least pressing of them to leave unfinished. As time goes on, however, the unfinished duties begin to compound themselves and become pressing issues. For instance, a torn bit of chafe gear that is left unattended will allow a critical line to wear through, compromising the rig.
-As the days and weeks wear on, the boat begins to break down in many small ways. The deficiencies begin to interact and create a hazardous work environment. For example, loose gear and personal effects clutter the hold, creating an unstable compartment underway.
-In addition, the officers who have been given additional specific duties have less time and energy to devote to general crew tasks. The sail handlers on public sails become slower to react to commands. Fewer crewmembers are available to do necessary maintenance. Those who make themselves available become more likely to make simple mistakes. The rigorous habits that make shipboard life clean and safe get laid by the wayside. This creates an environment ripe for accidents.
4. The recurring lack of core crew on the Hawaiian Chieftain is an immediate hazard to the boat and a long term hazard to the very stability and existence of our organization, and needs to be addressed.
-If the boat goes without core crewmembers for a short period of time, small things get missed and are attended to when the crew roster is filled. When the crew positions go unfilled for a long period of time, critical systems begin to break down. The rig goes untuned for several months. The bilge pumps are not maintained properly. Scaling rust forms on the hull where the paint has been scraped. A critical piece of standing rig breaks and is replaced by a quick fix that is kept in the rig through multiple transits. New crew members are not fully trained in emergency procedures.
-These breakdowns are not noticed on an organizational level because they do not interfere with the business of the boat on paper. Education programs, public tours, and sails all happen as scheduled.
-Boat life is unpredictable. At any point, a crewmember may experience a family emergency, or a pipe may break in the engine room, or a spar may crack, or the boat may encounter fierce, unexpected weather. Part of what makes boat life safe is the buffer that is put in place for unforeseen emergencies. Compartments are cleaned rigorously, crew members are trained to handle the rig with incredible speed and efficiency, and every boat system is kept in meticulous order.
-When core crew positions are left unfilled, this buffer goes away. If the crew is pushing hard just to sail the boat, nobody is available to help a passenger who suffers heatstroke. If a crewmember experiences a family emergency, the boat cannot spare him a day off to attend to it. If he takes the day regardless, the boat may find itself with too few crew to sail safely. A good example came up in the battle sail on May 5th. The crew member who was tending the Mizzen sail had to leave his post in order to instruct new volunteers on how to handle the braces during the middle of a tack. They had not been previously trained due to lack of available crew. Meanwhile, the Mizzen boom was swinging over the heads of passengers that no one was able to pay attention to. The Hawaiian Chieftain has a very tight and interdependent rig. When the core crew is reduced to six, situations like this become commonplace.
-While we, as employees of the Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport, recognize the need to keep revenue programs running, we feel that we are putting ourselves and our organization to be in real danger by continuing in this fashion. All it takes is one lawsuit by a seriously injured passenger to jeopardize our entire operation. If a critical part of our rig breaks after months of neglect, we may lose tens of thousands of dollars in revenue as well as the cost associated with repair. A crewmember who has not had a day off in nine weeks or adequate sleep in two may make life threatening mistakes while climbing aloft.
-If we are interested in the safety and health of our boats and our organization, we cannot continue as we are.
-The specific situation we find ourselves in on the Hawaiian Chieftain is as follows: We have three crewmembers on board who have previously served on the vessel. They are the Captain, Mate and Steward. The Engineer, Bosun, and Cook all have previous experience in their jobs, but are still learning the specifics of this boat. We have no long term volunteers. There are additionally six volunteers from the Evergreen State College who are training as deckhands while engaging in their own scholastic program. Of these twelve crewmembers, four are well versed in the education program, including the Captain and Mate. The rest are somewhat familiar with it, but need training and attention to carry it out to the level of quality that schools have come to expect from Gray's Harbor tallships. The Captain is the only individual aboard who is trained to do the Purser's paperwork. The current Bosun is faced with catching up on months' worth of neglect in the rig. The decision, therefore, to stop education programs in favor of training the new crewmembers and attending to our badly neglected rig is a natural one.
5. The benefits we gain in recognizing and correcting this problem now are immediate and concrete.
-A full roster of eight core crew plus at least three volunteer deckhands allows the crew to:
-Receive regular days off
-Train new crew effectively
-Do preventative maintenance on the rig and engineering systems
-Practice and prepare for emergencies
-Study for endorsements, such as AB Sail and Captain's licenses
-Regularly attend to personal health and hygiene, emotional and physical
-Communicate regularly and fully with the office
-Respond quickly and effectively to emergencies
-Step aboard other boats with words of praise and recommendation for Gray's Harbor tallships.
-A regular, seasonal rotation of crew will lend an immeasurable amount of stability to our organization. We will save many man-hours of work training new officers to their duties. We will eliminate the insecurity associated with taking dock jumpers aboard as essential crew. We will be able to undertake significant, necessary maintenance projects on board knowing that we will have to crew to finish them. We will rid ourselves of much of the pessimism and cynicism that pervades the crew's attitude toward the office. We will have a crew that feels supported, energetic, and able to manage their duties effectively.
-This goal is well within reach. All we need to do is change a few of our assumptions and habits. It is not easy, but it is necessary.
-This is not a process that cannot happen without good communication between every level of our organization. Our inter-organization communications have gotten noticeably better over the past few years. Let us not forget this.
6. We as a crew have set upon this course of action only because we feel we have no other recourse. We do this out of a sense of affection and care for our boat, our crew, our organization, and our mission.
-We understand fully that by leaving the Education Coordinator and Purser duties unfulfilled we are doing an immediate disservice to the schools we have contracted with and our mission as a boat. We feel that the short term ramifications of this are far outweighed by the disservice we do to our passengers when we sail with a poorly maintained boat and a fatigued crew.
-We believe sincerely that if the Education coordinator and Purser duties are carried out as usual in this port that this problem will cease to be addressed on an organizational level.
-It is important to note that the crewmembers currently aboard have not chosen to stop or fail in their duties. We have simply chosen to focus on the duties we have neglected over the past several weeks instead of the duties that we have taken up to cover for missing crewmembers. The Mate is still organizing the crew, the Bosun is still maintaining the rig, the Engineer is still attending to the ship's systems, the Steward is still greeting the community and introducing people to the boat, and the Cook is still nourishing the crew.
-The time for immediate stopgap fixes to recurring problems is past. We need to mature as an organization and look forward to the long term stability and well-being of our organization.
- We must recognize our current problems as symptoms of a systemic dysfunction. Rather than simply attend to the symptoms, me must address the issue as a whole, looking toward the long term benefit rather than the short term obstacle. If we fail to so this, we will find ourselves in this predicament again and again.
- If we successfully institute a new, healthy model of crew recruitment, the Gray's Harbor Historical Seaport Authority as an organization and the Hawaiian Chieftain as a boat will function significantly better. This will allow us to focus our energies on our core mission of education and community outreach.