Training isn't everything........
A Coast Guard investigation into the grounding in March of a cargo ship in the Chesapeake Bay is faulting the pilot tasked with helping the ship navigate the waterway.
apnews.com
Licensing requirements for a Bay Pilot.
All applicants must have Coast Guard licenses certifying them to be master or chief mate of any-sized ship.
New entrants spend two years as apprentices, accompanying senior pilots on both in transit and docking. Then comes a three-year stint as a junior pilot, guiding medium-sized vessels with drafts of 28 feet or less, and, later, deeper boats with drafts up to 34 feet.
Apprentices must complete more than 500 passages up and down the Bay and 30 with tugboats before they can sit for the exams to be designated full-fledged senior pilot.
Senior pilots must pass a spate of written and on-the-job tests and reproduce from memory 10 large-sized nautical charts covering the waters from Cape Henry to the head of the Chesapeake. “We give them a blank sheet of paper, with only the shoreline printed on it, and they have to fill in the buoys, the depth contours, the lights, the seabed characteristics, the wrecks, and any special regulations the chart contains.
Apprentices must complete more than 500 passages up and down the Bay and 30 with tugboats before they can sit for the exams to be designated full-fledged senior pilot.