06/004 - Joining first time as a tanker master

You are planned to join v/l in US after briefing at [Asian City]. Generally contracts & tickets are given few hours’ prior flying. When joining it is natural for a person to be tensed & anxious. Once you arrive after long night flight at [Asian City] you are asked to make your own arrangements & arrive in hotel. After getting freshened up you go to office for briefing. Already jet legged one is made to sit in office for briefing purposes which is often done in such a haste that one reaches ship totally confused & tired. Everyone in 8-10 hrs want to brief on there section without bothering if you are under standing or not. To add towards end to complete formality you are asked to sign on briefing form. In office you are informed that ship is due to complete loading & you will get about 4 hours for take over. In this time I think you can only take over cash & sign and get ready to face consequences as and when it comes. Anyway too late to react. Once you are seen off with good wishes from office you are in hotel not to take rest but for your next flight. After picking luggage you are at Airport with stop over in some country for change over of flights.

With such a long flight by the time you arrive in US you are tired, exhausted & terribly jet lagged. From airport you are thrown on ship where another anxious person is waiting for you to listen to him, take over cash so that he can wash off his hands and say good bye with token that his tenure was beautiful and he never had any problems. Now if something goes wrong who will be responsible for this? Next port from Houston is [near by port] which is abt 33 hrs. There you have discharging operations. After discharging sailing back to Houston for loading. In this time you have to prepare tanks for loading. Send all mandatory messages to USCG. Get familiarized with v/l, certificates etc. If before joining vessel Master is suppose to go to office for briefing is’t it necessary for Master to be adequately rested before reaching vessel. Can’t this briefing procedure be pre-pone for 3 days so that briefing is done in proper way and Master gets enough rest?