I work in the oil and gas industry on a supply boat out in Western Australia and by coincidence was flying back into Tauranga for my month's leave the morning the motor vessel Rena was aground on the Astrolabe Reef.

My wife, picking me up at the airport, passed the comment there was a container ship aground off the port... and being in my usual state of weariness from work and travel and looking forward to some rest, I merely passed the comment 'well, at least the weather is fine and settled, so the port can get moving on rectifying the problem'...

So, later that day when watching the evening news I am already surprised and feeling some concern when it seems not a great deal of activity is taking place to sort the problem. By the 2nd and 3rd day I was passing the comment ' this inaction has all the making of a Maritime version of a 'Pike River Mine Disaster' with the major problem of pollution from heavy fuel oil to add to the mix...

So, the last week of events have developed and the present scenario looking to go from bad to worse with containers adrift and still a full load of 1300 odd boxes on the ship plus another 1300 odd tonnes of fuel still onboard...

Now we really have serious issues prevailing on how to get the stuff off a broken ship and into a secure containment to bring ashore. Seems with a list of over 20 degree, broken hull amidships and a dead ship, (crew all gone and no ships power running), the salvage team now have the unenviable task of attempting to deal with these developments.

Not so easy now to enter into such an environment and attempt to reinstate ships power before even starting to how to deal with an oil transfer from a ship listing over 20 degrees... Oh how they must wish they could do it all over again from starting at day 1.

So, here are my comments on how I am sure we lost the opportunity in the first 4 days to salvage something from this chain of events that might have prevented what is happening now and unfortunately is looking like will only get worse...

In the 'good old days' which was not that long ago actually, the commercial ports around New Zealand were run and controlled by the Harbour Master... the Harbour Master was an individual with a full maritime background. He was a 'Master Mariner'... that is, someone with a masters foreign going certificate, unlimited tonnage, years of experience in a sea-going capacity on world wide trade, working his way up through the ranks to Master over many years... By the time he had worked ashore as a Pilot and reached the position in the port of being the Harbour Master he would be both senior in years and experience...

He would have the support in the harbour board of a Ports Engineer, someone who like himself had spent the majority of his working life at sea, but this time as an engineer, working through the ranks to sail as a Chief Engineer with a 1st class certificate, motor and steam, unlimited horsepower, again someone with years of experience in ships and the sea...

Put this combination together ashore and ports were run effectively and able to deal with all manner of maritime contingencies.

Imagine the scenario that morning when the Rena went aground... suitable tugs would have been deployed to secure tow lines to the stern of the vessel, the bunkering barge would have been sent out to start unloading fuel from the ships bunker tanks, if needs be, the floating crane would have been sent out to start unloading deck cargo...

All of the above would have commenced or would have been planned for on the morning of the grounding...

Unfortunately we don't have such individuals running our ports anymore. We have CEO's who achieved their position, not from a maritime background, but from the ability to take over organizations, trim them 'lean and mean', improve profitability and appease the shareholders, in other words, someone with a successful career in business management.

The powerful tugs, bunkering barge and floating crane are long gone, being classed as 'unnecessary overheads serving little purpose to maintain and even less likelihood of being required'...

Having my background in ships and the sea, I know my port from my starboard and forward end of the ship from the stern'... I will not even get into the meaning of flotsam & jetsam although we are already getting plenty of that overboard at present... It was disturbing to hear on the news this week so called 'experts' referring to 'the back end of the ship'...

Unfortunately it is not only our ports which lack credible management as outlined above... our newly named Maritime NZ (previously MSA) is also lacking the 'Master Mariner' in charge... this time we have a female CEO in charge... any nautical background there?

Finally, to conclude... when the window of opportunity of the 1st four days was rapidly disappearing, why was there a decision made to transfer 700 tonnes of fuel from suspect tanks forward and amidships to the aft end of the vessel?

Fine enough idea if the weather was going to stay fine and the oil could be pumped off before the weather closed in... but knowing what weather was forecast, pumping continued and the scenario then set to have a vessel now in a over loaded and stressed condition on bending moments with all this additional weight aft and the rest of the hull amidships to forward grounded on the reef...

Should we now be surprised to see how the hull, flexing in heavy weather and a now in a overloaded aft condition, open up amidships? We should be asking did we not actually caused these sequence of events from our actions?

I doubt we would have much of the above taking place if the old style 'Harbour Master' had been in charge.

Rod Hale.