Indian coastal shipping may permit foreign flag ships . . .

DG Shipping has issued a note, seeking stakeholders and others to comment on a proposal to open up certain segments of coastal shipping in India to foreign flag merchant navy ships, initially only for loaded containers to be trans-shipped to and from Indian ports. The note can be viewed on DG Shipping's website, and seeks responses by 34th of November 2010.

In brief:-

# Loaded containers only to be moved between Indian ports on foreign flag vessels.
# These foreign flag container ships may be permitted relaxation in manning norms, usually not available to Indian flag ships.
# Cabotage protection will continue for other types of ships on the Indian coast.
# Preferential freight will still continue for Indian flag ships, up from 10% to 25%.
# A separate note has been issued for coastal river-sea vessels under the Indian flag too.

All in all, exciting days ahead for coastal shipping, and who knows - we may yet have a vibrant coastal shipping industry?

So, are you an NRI, or what?

Here's a quick article I did for Sailor Today on tax-free status . . . and even more relevant now than ever before. Please do visit and ask your tax consultant for more . . .

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The issue of a review in NRI status from, broadly, not more than 6 months a year to 2 months a year, has caused great debate and worry with seafarers - both present, prospective and past. And rightly so. This is one of the most widely misunderstood and misinterpreted aspects of Income Tax in India, which is one reason why the new Direct Tax Code (DTC) is trying to address that too. Many will now have to rework startegies.

 

Interim, here are a few basic observation, issued in best interest but without guarantee. Please do consult your own taxation entities for any decision you wish to take pertaining to fiduciary issues.

 

1) The new DTC will come into effect from the 1st of April 2012. Likely. Maybe, but at the same time, maybe earlier, maybe later. This remains to be seen.

 

2) The present dispensation of not more than 6 months in a year is water-tight. Not really, it comes with a few ryders and conditions, some extremely complex.

 

3) To be on the safe side, stay out of the country on a foreign flag ship for atleast 190 days. Apparently, that's not enough, and here are some queries being raised:-

 

# Did the ship in question visit India or enter territorial waters/Economic Zone at any time. That's 200 miles.

# Did the NRI sign an agreement with any entity/company/agent in India. If he did, how was he an "NRI"?

# Did the seafarer get "control" of the money in India? (Means - where was the bank account)

# Did the seafarer NRI exceed 365 days in India in total in the last 3-4 financial years.

# Where was his place of residence while an NRI. Ship was place of work. Explain the issue.

 

This is not something that SAILOR TODAY concurs with, or supports - but we would not be doing our job if we did not bring this to your notice. As for the Income Tax Authorities, their focus is clear - incremental taxation from any source is their aim.

 

Complicated days ahead for NRI seafarers unless something is done, and soon. Otherwise, the best advice we can give you is - proceed with caution.

 

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The case of the disturbing personal eMail - NORFOLK EXPRESS grounding

The Chief Officer of the NORFOLK EXPRESS received a personal eMail while on watch which troubled him so much that he lost all semblance of attentiveness, resulting in the ship going aground at full speed in the Gulf of Suez, because he was totally distracted.

Read more about it here:-

http://maritimeaccident.org/2009/10/norfolk-worries-led-to-grounding/

The lookout has been sent elsewhere for other tasks.

To quote from the article:-

A number of lessons arise from the incident, the most obvious relates to lookouts. Many of us prefer to be alone when dealing with personal issues and its tempting to send the lookout away so we can be alone with our thoughts. Unfortunately, those are the very conditions under which we need to have a lookout present in case we get so deep in our own concerns we lose track of what’s going on.
Whatever the psychological state of the officer of the watch a lookout might have made the difference.
At the same time, two alarms were not functioning, the bridge watch alarm which should have sounded every 12 minutes, and the echo sounder depth alarm. BSU says that it is uncertain that these would have alerted the chief officer to the situation.
Two GPS waypoint alarms sounded but were not responded to.

Casaulties in the American Merchant Navy during WW-II

++1 in 26 mariners serving aboard merchant ships in World WW II died in the line of duty, suffering a greater percentage of war-related deaths than all other U.S. services. Casualties were kept secret during the War to keep information about their success from the enemy and to attract and keep mariners at sea.++

http://www.usmm.org/

Thanks to http://adventures-of-the-blackgang.tumblr.com/

Full report on the Hanjin Gotherburd/Chang Tong collision

Seldom have I seen such amazing photographs as these. A container ship at 25 knots slices through the midships of a bulk carrier, both were in an end-on situation, clear visibility, classic case of faster vessel altering to port in a TSS, while the slower bulker alters to starboard.

http://www.bsu-bund.de/cln_005/nn_101744/SharedDocs/pdf/EN/Investigation__Report/2008/Investigation__Report__450__07,templateId=raw,property=publicationFile.pdf/Investigation_Report_450_07.pdf

Worth the visit, if only for the photos.

Quick solution to the problem of fatigue at sea . . .

The issue of seafarer fatigue on board ships gets worse with every passing evolution. Whether it is shorter port turnaround, bigger and more complicated ships or reduction in headcount on board, fact remains, this is the only profession in the world where people have to fudge their time sheets to show that they have worked 98 hours in a week. While the rest of the world moves towards 35-40 hour weeks and quality of life parameters based, seafarers are pushed to the edge, and more.

Take a look here at what the MCA in England did to the Maersk Patras:-

http://www.bymnews.com/news/newsDetails.php?id=76428

And this is one of the biggest and best, blue of the blue, right?

One solution would be to change the watch-keeping pattern from 4-on 8-off to 3-on 9-off, viz, 4 watch-keepers instead of 3, under normal circumstances. An argument raised against this is that as it is there is shortage of trained manpower, so where will the shipowners get 33% more trained watchkeepers from?

The answer is also here - womenpower may yet solve the problem. The colateral effect of making seafaring a more attractive profession, by addressing the overwork and fatigue issues, will attract more young people, both women and men. We just have to give it a go.

So what can you do, active seafarer, at sea? One option is to start logging woking hour audits honestly, and when you are fatigued, logging it. Or writing in.

Humbly submitted.