OnWatch

Karen and Margaret entered the famously rigorous U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point soon after Kings Point first admitted women back in 1978. That’s Margaret pictured in her first week. Gard’s Kim Jefferies had the pleasure and honour to talk with these two extraordinary women about where their experience at Kings Point has taken them in life and how they and fellow women graduates support women and girls to succeed in non-traditional careers.  Margaret currently heads the Alternative Fuels Program at Transparensea Fuels and is founder and President of the non-profit PortVision50. Karen is Managing Director of OCIMF.  

Our guest Dr. Alice Larkin, Professor in Climate Science and Energy Policy at the University of Manchester, sets up the challenge in explaining her work researching "committed emissions" in shipping, that is the GHG emissions to be expected during the lifetime of today's fleet.  Her study shows that the carbon budget for shipping will be nearly or completely depleted without immediate emissions reductions. Our guest, Haris Zografakis, a partner with the law firm Stephenson Harwood,  explains how shipping can, sector by sector, improve efficiency and reduce emissions by up to 15% and without retrofitting. The Blue Visby Solution, now in the pilot stage, aims to change the historical and current practice to "sail fast, then wait" with a combination of technology and a new contractual architecture.  

In our podcast this International Women’s Day, we listen in on a conversation between our Gard colleague Monica Kohli and Amb. Nancy Karigithu.  Monica is a lawyer with the London Defence team and President of WISTA UK. Nancy is a Kenyan maritime lawyer acting as Special Envoy Maritime and Blue Economy and is a candidate for the IMO Secretary General.  She shares some sage advice for young people interested in entering the maritime sector. 

According to the FAO, illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing accounts for up to 26 million tons of fish caught annually.  Ocean Risk and Resilience Action Alliance (ORRAA) together with partners, TM Tracking and Global Fishing Watch have developed a tool for the insurance industry to assess the risks that insured fishing vessels and prospects are breaking the rules. Gard is one of the insurance providers testing the tool in the pilot program.  Gard's Kim Jefferies spoke with ORRAA’s Lindsay Getschel about the Vessel Viewer tool and what it will do to increase transparency around fishing vessel activities. 

(Photo credit TM Tracking)

Gard has released the Mariners Medico Guide, a digital, tailor-made, medical guide for assessment and treatment of seafarers aboard ship. We caught up with two special women who spearheaded the project, Gard’s Alice Jackson Amundsen and Dr. Lise Skogstad Loftsgard from the Norwegian Centre for Maritime and Diving Medicine.  Lise and Alice walk us through the process from idea to release and what this app will mean for seafarer health and wellbeing. The app is free of charge and available for all seafarers sailing on the world fleet. It can be downloaded as a desktop version from www.medicoguide.no and is available for mobile devices in the Apple App Store and Google Play.

US Attorney, David Farrell wrote an intriguing article about the near demise of the US flag international fleet in the Tulane Maritime Law Journal titled “After 100 years: Has the Jones Act Sunk the Jones Act and vice versa?”. We talked about the history of the two prongs of the Jones Act legislation, cabotage and personal injury protection and compared the US closed registry for international ships to the system in Norway.  Finally, Dave gives his view on the potential impact of the Jones Act on the current US Administration efforts to quickly ramp up offshore wind energy production.

BIMCO’s back of the envelope estimate is that more than 1.7 billion plastic water bottles are used on board commercial ships every year.  MARPOL Annex V prohibits discharge overboard of garbage including plastics of all kinds.  That does not mean that plastic bottles and other plastic waste generated on board does not enter the ocean. For example, ships cannot control waste handling on shore.  

We are pleased to feature an interview of Alice Jackson Amundsen by Lena Gothberg, host of the Shipping Podcast.  Alice led Gard’s global people claims group before retiring after close to 35 years with Gard.  Her discussion with Lena covers Alice’s own career with Gard as well as the enormous challenges faced by seafarers in the COVID pandemic. Have a listen.

Today we observe International Women’s Day with our On Watch podcast – “See it to be it – improving gender diversity on board.”  Our hosts, Kim Jefferies and Kunal Pathak speak with two extraordinary women – Jessie Elizabeth Shifalo and Monica Kohli about their experiences aboard ship and ashore and how mentorship and networking can promote women in seafaring careers as well as shore based maritime industries.

Networking and mentorship resources mentioned by our guests include Women’s International Shipping and Trading Association (WISTA) and Women Offshore MentorSHIP program. 

For our third and final podcast in our series about the Trans Carrier nurdle spill, we reached out to SALT, a Norwegian organization that was not involved in the spill and clean-up. SALT is a Norwegian consultancy specializing in marine pollution, marine management and coastal development. We spoke with Brita Staal and Joan Fabres about the scope of nurdle pollution and the effect of nurdle spills on the environment before concluding with a lively exchange of views on potential measures to prevent spills.

In the second in our series on the Trans Carrier nurdle spill, we speak with Thomas Sturgeon, of ITOPF. ITOPF is an international marine pollution consultancy and is Gard’s go to expert for advice in the aftermath of casualties involving pollution of all types. Nurdles are the building blocks for plastic products and are about the size and shape of a lentil. Thomas provides insight into the difficulty of the Trans Carrier clean-up due to the small size of nurdles and the wide disbursement. 

In this episode of “OnWatch” we discuss the some key elements of culture and the impact of leadership in shaping the performance of organisations. We talk to Dr. Torkel Soma of SAYFR to understand the true value, and cost, of organisational culture and how it can be improved. Tune in to learn more….

August 19, Kim Jefferies had the opportunity to speak with Bernt about the effect the take over of the Taliban in Afghanistan will have on the Red Cross and Red Crescent humanitarian effort there as well as the enormous challenges facing Haiti. Bernt also describes the humanitarian work during the pandemic and looks toward the future when facing our biggest global challenge – the climate crisis. Gard is honored to be a strategic partner with the Norwegian Red Cross and grateful for the time Bernt spent with us in Arendal.    

In February 2020, the Ro-Ro vessel, Trans Carrier, hit heavy weather off the Danish coast on its way to Stavanger, Norway.  A container on deck shifted and was damaged in the storm, spilling plastic pellets into the sea.  Our guests Gisle Rong and Ole Aasbø tell what happened in the aftermath of the casualty and we discuss what can be done to clean-up and prevent spills in the future.

In his first episode, host Kunal Pathak spoke with a seafarer who fell into the grips of an unscrupulous recruiter and shipowner suffering abuse and abandonment. In this continuation we hear from Gard’s head of people claims, Alice Amundsen about the shortcoming of the Maritime Labour Convention in getting seafarers off the vessel and back home to their families. She and ITF coordinator, Mohamed Arrachedi, also provide tips to seafarers to avoid signing on with companies that may mistreat or abandon them and what to do if it occurs.

To commemorate the IMO Day of the Seafarer, host Kunal Pathak speaks with a seafarer who fell into the grips of an unscrupulous recruiter and shipowner suffering abuse and abandonment. Kunal also touches base with the ITF and Gard’s head of people claims to understand the scale of the problem.