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Marine simulator facility test brings out the best
Seaspan Marine is invested in training its staff to be the very best it can be, which is why the Marine Simulator Facility was created. According to Bart Reynolds, president of Seaspan Marine, most training of personnel in the marine industry was similar to how many young people learned to drive, with instruction from parents or guardians. By Cindy Chan
Through this method, the young driver would have picked up whatever good – and bad – habits their teacher possessed.
“Certainly, there were certain aspects of driving you didn’t pick up and were never taught, because you weren’t taught by a professional,” Reynolds says. “The ad hoc system of training works at a certain level of competency, but it’s not the same
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from one person to the next. We were looking for opportunities to do better.”
Reynolds says Seaspan Marine searched high and low to see who had better training methods and what systems were out there that were productive not only in terms of how long it took to train somebody but also at what level in the end. That’s when Seaspan Marine learned about SeaWays Global, the international standard bearer in tug training, simulation, auditing and assessments.
“When we found them, they had trained 1,500 tugmasters with their system across the world,” Reynolds says.
What sets SeaWays Global apart is the training is certified by a third-party certification society, which means a third party will come in and certify that someone is operating to a certain standard.
“This is the only training program for tugmasters that is certified, which piqued our interest,” Reynolds says.
Seaspan Marine invited SeaWays Global to Vancouver to learn more about their program. In just a couple of hours, SeaWays Global had already made a list of areas to improve standardization across the fleet. As a result, Seaspan Marine sent four tugmasters to the SeaWays Global training facility in the United Kingdom to go through the course.
The 10-day, intensive course involved simulation; each instructor was responsible for two students. Following the 10 days of simulation was six days of live training, doing exactly what they did in the simulator but on vessels. Afterwards, the students went back to Vancouver to do the six days of live training on their vessels.
“The four guys we sent over there were amazed at how much they learned and how much better they became at handling tugboats,” Reynolds says. “We decided we were going to do this for all of our people.”
Reynolds and his team decided that rather than sending everyone overseas, they were going to build their own simulator to have access to year-round.
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with SeaWays Global in May 2018 for the first round of classes. In March 2019, Seaspan Marine opened its own simulator – the first of its kind in North America.
The facility features two identical simulator rooms that are fully enclosed. There are 360-degree, floor-to-ceiling video screens in the rooms so students can feel as though they are actually on a tugboat.
“We can run two separate training courses or exercises, or we can bring the two together if we wanted,” Reynolds says. “A third room is set up with a smart board and touchscreens, so it can be used as a training room.
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“With the help of SeaWays Global, we put this together. They love to come here now because the simulator we have is better than what they have in their own facility,” Reynolds adds.
Seaspan Marine will have trained 100 of their mariners by the middle of 2021.
“We’re using the facility full-time, training our people as quickly as possible. Because we can only train four people at a time, it takes time, but we’re really pleased with the results,” Reynolds says.
Once masters have finished their simulator and live training, they are required to take a timed test that takes place live on the vessel, which involves a number of different maneuvers.
“The instructor does it first, and then the student has to do it within 30 per cent of the time,” Reynolds explains, adding that the test is pass/fail. “They have to do it four times to prove they’ve got the skill set, the proof of competency.”
The course teaches a total of 25 different skills. Each year, mariners must re-test to ensure they still have the skill set.
“It’s a great thing for us to say to our customers – that we have something here that’s third-party certified, that shows our people are competent to the highest standard,” Reynolds says. Ü
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