Assalamoalikum, This is your Captain Zahid Nisar, welcoming you to Orange shots..
Today's Video is a continuation of the video where I told You about a vessel loosing Power close to Port.
I told you about a vessel that lost Power in Singapore Port
When you loose power at Open sea, it depends (What Consequences the vessel would have to face)
if the fault is grave then you might need to be salvaged and Towed off..
You might be able to fix it on board if it's not that severe ..
In our Case it was a bit of Both.
It was the Year 2011
and it were these same months of March / April
We had departed from USA after discharging ..
We also did replenish the vessel with Bunker oil there ..
After a few days of departure, when the Oil level in the bunker tanks dropped ...
I am talking about the previous Bunker here that was already in use ..
CE talked with tech dept to put the new bunker (received in USA) in use in Main Engine Only ..
And keep using the previous Bunker in Generators ...
We had received the Laboratory report of the new Bunker, it wasn't so good ...
We started using that Bunker in ship's Main engine (adhering to all cautions) ...
& just after a couple of days, close to midnight we received ME SLOW DOWN alarm ...
We shut down the Main Engine ..
Chief engineer Was very worried ...
His opinion was that this new Bunker had ceased the FUEL PUMPS ...
He had his doubts on the Bunker Quality ...
Captain Called me ...
and he said that Chief ,,, I think we have a big issue at hand ...
It was Captain SZH Hamdani...
He asked me to go on bridge and have a look on Chart, Radar, etc ...
Consult ECDIS too and try to devise a plan in case we'd stay adrift for 4/5 days...
Now we are in Caribbean sea drifting at the mercy of Wind and currents ...
I informed Captain that closest West Indian Island was around 300 miles away ..
Vessel was drifting at a speed of 2.0 Knots ...
considering that it would take us months to get close to that island at this drift rate ...
Captain told me to also plan for (depending upon drift) anchoring option ...
in case vessel reaches in suitable depths..
In Video about Ship's Bow I told you about vessel's anchor ...
That anchor is used to grab the ground underneath and stay at a position ...
In Open sea where depths are high ... We can't use anchor ...
Because in higher depths the anchor won't even touch the bottom..
So I went to bridge and we marked a line on ECDIS denoting the suitable depths for anchoring ...
Lloyd.. The ACO that you guys must have seen in my videos ...
He was 2nd Officer with me at that time ...
He basically marked that boundary line and we informed all bridge officers ...
that they should let me know if the vessel crosses that line... to check possibility of anchoring ..
after about 3 days, we were hardly able to remove the Fuel pumps...
But we were still unable to dismantle them ..
we took Big 200L drums, cut them in the half, put LUB OIL in them ..
we put 'em on Hot plates in Galley and Immersed our Fuel Pumps in those ...
She was a Panamax vessel and we were able to partially immerse the pumps in Oil ...
The drums were longitudinally cut in to half ...
and Thankfully that helped dismantle the pumps ..
we were keeping the head office updated about the progress ..
and of course they were inquiring daily about our estimation and if we required any assistance...
Capt. Told them on the first day itself, that all going well it could take a couple of days and in case something gets stuck ..
it could take weeks too ..
That's actually what happened, it took us almost a week ..
and Capt had told CE as well to proceed with ease as we had no Voyage Orders ..
We had already switched on Not Under command Lights...
You switch them ON to let other ships in the vicinity know about Your Status ..
That you cannot keep out of the way of the other vessels & that now every other ship has to keep out of your way ..
and then there's a day signal too (for NOT UNDER COMMAND status)
To be honest, it was a bit tense too ...
You're drifting at the mercy of waves, wind and current ..
You cannot steer her, she's drifting astray ..
Captain had already refused the Tugs' Assistance ..
He hoped that ship's staff would resolve the issue and as there were no orders for ship so there was no hurry as well..
on 6th day of this Saga the Engineers were finally able to Overhaul the Fuel Pumps ..
We boxed back all the Fuel pumps, tried out the main engine and finally resumed Voyage ..
But the story doesn't end here ..
We tried out the MAIN ENGINE using the previous Bunker ..
The one we had before USA ..
Chief Engineer didn't want to run Main Engine again on the same Bunker from USA ...
& the previous bunker (being used in Generators) was quite limited ..
He wasn't ready to run Main engine again on the same Bunker (That caused seizure of FP's)
And so was the Captain ...
it was finally decided to convert Main Engine to Diesel oil and Proceed towards Aruba.
Usually we don't Use Diesel Oil in Main Engine but we do have Diesel Oil for certain situations ..
We usually keep around 200 ~400 Tonnes of Diesel Oil ...
This Diesel Oil Came handy in this situation ...
We used DO in Main engine, FO in Generators, they asked us to go to Aruba for Bunkering..
We Took new bunker in Aruba..
We put this bad bunker out of Use ..
& almost after 2 months we went back to America, The port was Houston ...
And we finally returned that Bunker to supplier and thankfully got rid of it ...
This was one interesting incident, and everyone who used to pass ...
always asked us if we were fine and if we needed assistance ..
Heavy Rain is approaching from Head ..
Wind has increased too ..
All of this is rain ..
Anyway that's what I wanted to Share with you guys, our vessel was disabled at open sea ..
in case you learned something new from this video or found it entertaining, then please like the video, share it and subscribe to the Channel ..
It has started raining & with tonnes of love for my orange shots family and to be orange shots Family ..
This is me Zahid Nisar, you're watching Orange Shots ..
Until the next Video... Bye ..
The Camera is ALL WET ..