[BITList] Fwd: Extract from Lloyd's List

[Ronald Thomas]

Mike. Thanks for that email. I couldn't agree more with the opinions 
stated. Early Apprenticeships at sea were invaluable as one had to 
progress through the ranks having knowledge-gained by experience and 
many hours on an open bridge, with NO Radar to fully understand the 
perils that may lie ahead ( and possibly astern). In the West country, 
where I have just moved to from France my mind boggles at the thought of 
two driver less cars coming head to head on the single track country 
lanes. Salaams Ronald Thomas

------ Original Message ------
From: "Ronald Thomas" <thomasronald775 at gmail.com>
To: "BitList" <bitlist at lists.bcn.mythic-beasts.com>
Sent: 05/08/2018 20:49:30
Subject: Re: [BITList] Fwd: Extract from Lloyd's List

>
>
>------ Original Message ------
>From: "michael J Feltham" <ismay at mjfeltham.plus.com>
>To:
>Sent: 05/08/2018 08:51:46
>Subject: [BITList] Fwd: Extract from Lloyd's List
>
>>This is from a correspondent from Lloyd’s List.  An ex seafarer.
>>
>>Mike
>>—————————————————————————————————————
>>
>>Viewpoint: Mind in neutral
>>>By : Michael Grey
>>>
>>>WHY on earth do well-found ships, properly manned by certificated 
>>>officers and crews, manage to run aground or collide, in 
>>>circumstances that seem to defy rational explanation?
>>>
>>>There seems little excuse, in an era when circling satellites provide 
>>>all the positioning data those on board a ship might need. It was 
>>>understandable in the days of dead reckoning and before the 
>>>all-seeing eye of radar. But the equipment on a modern ship, if 
>>>properly set up and diligently used, ought to make such casualties 
>>>impossible. It is by no means an original suggestion, but may the 
>>>versatility and capability of the equipment itself contribute to the 
>>>human navigator, or engineer for that matter, just losing 
>>>concentration? And then, when an unforeseen hazard occurs, failing to 
>>>put a mind that is coasting along in neutral, back into an 
>>>operational gear? If we are relegating a ship’s officer, who has 
>>>probably passed all sorts of statutory examinations, to the role of a 
>>>mere overseer of smart machines, how can an intelligent person remain 
>>>focused?
>>>
>>>More years ago than I care to remember, when I was serving an 
>>>apprenticeship at sea, we were forced to relieve the quartermaster on 
>>>the wheel for a two-hour stretch from 0600 hrs every morning. Quite 
>>>what it was supposed to teach us I cannot recall, other than patience 
>>>and fortitude, as it was one of the most mind-numbingly boring jobs 
>>>you could imagine on a deepsea passage. Just keeping the wretched 
>>>ship on course, half-asleep and looking forward to a large breakfast, 
>>>was a real challenge of concentration. The occasional sarcastic 
>>>question from the Second Mate, looking up from his star calculations, 
>>>to find the ship falling off the course and the gyro ticking away 
>>>reproachfully, was a reminder that I really was not cut out for the 
>>>job. “Trying to write your name in the sea, Grey?” It is why 
>>>automatic steering machinery was invented.Vigilance and attention are 
>>>important qualities. Those involved in search and rescue operations 
>>>are regularly relieved from their visual or radar lookouts because it 
>>>is known concentration wanes after about 20 minutes. It is the same 
>>>with air traffic control operators, whose lapse in attention could be 
>>>fatal. Maybe we should learn from these roles. There is a debate 
>>>about whether the “driver-assist” features on the latest high-end 
>>>road vehicles are too clever for their own good, easing the job of 
>>>driving to such an extent that concentration lapses. Anyone with half 
>>>a brain, who is not making or selling cars for a living, can see this 
>>>problem a mile off.
>>>
>>
>>>Devices that ought to be banned
>>>One can only hope that before too many people meet an untimely end on 
>>>our roads, something may be done about this, because anything that 
>>>distracts the driver from the main task of keeping the car safe is 
>>>potentially lethal. It ought also to divert our regulators from their 
>>>current enthusiasm for “driverless” vehicles, before too much 
>>>taxpayers’ money is shovelled into this fatal project. Devices that 
>>>minimise the need for concentration, permitting the mind to wander 
>>>and even to become engaged on other tasks, ought to be banned, 
>>>whether we are talking about a “self-driving” truck or a large ship 
>>>with equipment that removes all the actual work from sentient human 
>>>beings aboard. Initially, automation on land or sea was regarded as 
>>>wholly positive, as it removed the need for people to be engaged in 
>>>boring, repetitive work that they probably could not do as well as a 
>>>machine. The people could be doing something more useful. But on the 
>>>bridge or machinery space of a ship, if the watchkeepers have to be 
>>>there, they are better engaged with the main task of navigating and 
>>>collision avoidance, and not relegated to “long stop”, overseeing the 
>>>equipment that is doing all the work and intervening only when it 
>>>breaks down. Casualty after casualty reveals the person whose 
>>>attention might have averted the incident was either suffering from a 
>>>wandering mind, or possibly even asleep, as there was little to keep 
>>>them awake in this supine role of overseer.
>>>Casualty investigators often cite “complacency”, but I would suggest 
>>>that a “mind in neutral”, lulled into a semi-comatose state of 
>>>non-intervention is as often to blame. What is the point of this 
>>>equipment, with its need for frequent updates, its cost and 
>>>complexity, if it contributes to this state of “operator” 
>>>non-involvement? Might actual practice demonstrate the negatives 
>>>outweigh the positives?
>>>You will not get any of the clever folk developing and manufacturing 
>>>this equipment to admit this, because they energetically lobby the 
>>>International Maritime Organization to persuade it that fitting their 
>>>latest all singing, all dancing gizmo should be made mandatory. I 
>>>recall a friendship of many years with a chief sales manager of 
>>>navigational equipment being somewhat strained when I suggested he 
>>>should wire up watchkeepers to electrodes and give them electric 
>>>shocks to keep them concentrating, such were the tasks his latest 
>>>“integrated navigator” was removing from their roles. I suggest the 
>>>rule makers ought only to listen to those who actually run ships for 
>>>a living before letting the manufacturers into the IMO building. But 
>>>I doubt that this will happen. Unlike those people at sea, trying to 
>>>stay awake and focused, the vested interests never lose their 
>>>concentration.source: lloydslist
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
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