We had just finished discharging cargo across European ports and our ship was anchored off Rotterdam, Holland, when our company’s head office asked us to proceed towards the Great Lakes in eastern Canada.
I was the chief engineer on the ship, and my wife and sons (then aged seven and 11) were accompanying me. Since all the cargo had been unloaded, we filled the ship’s ballast tanks with sea water to provide the vessel with some stability in the turbulent Atlantic waters.
During the long passage to Canada, we encountered one storm after another, and since the ship was in ballast, she was continuously rolling and pitching, so much so that even seasoned crew members were suffering bouts of sea sickness. However, my wife and sons sailed through the storms without much discomfort. If anything, my sons thoroughly enjoyed the see-saw like movement of the heaving ship.
We were around halfway across the Atlantic Ocean, when we were hit by a violent storm, and huge waves began slamming the ship’s deck, some even traversing her width. Soon, our vessel was being tossed around like a cork, and was also shipping an enormous amount of sea water on her open decks. One of the waves hit our pipeline, which was at least a foot in diameter and 20-feet in length, with such force that it was severely mangled.
That night, my wife was unable to sleep due to the oceanic turbulence, and she spotted a shower of sparks from our bedroom’s porthole. She immediately roused me, and I realised that the Jumbo Derrick, a heavy lifting device, was sparking.
As the captain of the ship was indisposed, I informed the duty officer and asked him to alter the ship’s course immediately, before the Jumbo Derrick could come crashing down on the deck. The ship took some time to stabilise after changing her course to avoid the storm hitting her from the broadside. However, the heavy device did come loose and slid horizontally onto the deck. It took the crew some effort to tether it.
If it were not for my wife’s timely warning, we would not have been able to change the course, and the Jumbo Derrick could have pierced through the deck. Had that happened, the large amount of storm water that had collected on the open deck due to the storm could have entered the cargo holds, and the ship could have capsized.
Once the storm somewhat abated after a few hours, the ship’s officers thanked my wife for the timely alert. The duty officer could have spotted the sparks as well, but could have inadvertently ignored them, mistaking them for lightening streaks, which are frequent during storms. There was a long delay before the ship could resume her normal course,and the matter had to be reported. Even during the inquiry, my wife’s role was well appreciated.
My wife has passed away now, but she would have been delighted to see this anecdote published.
( The writer is an Amritsar-based retired chief engineer)
