Wow! I’m struggling to find the right words to describe my first full day aboard Logos Hope. I always knew, intellectually, that what OM are doing with the LH project is a massive undertaking. Today, I got a taste of what it really means and to experience it first-hand has been such an eye-opener.
My alarm went off at 6:20 and I got up and showered (first mistake – more of this later!), then Paul came by my cabin and we went for breakfast. Right from the get-go, people were wanting to talk to Paul and have technical discussions with him – I was starting to realise just how many plates he and the other team leaders are having to keep spinning. Breakfast done, we went to the morning devotions. Listening to the director of the ship speak, I was struck by the vision and commitment of all those who are, and have been a part of this project. It’s already having a great impact – local people and dock workers are saying that there’s something really different about the ship – the atmosphere and sense of purpose are really noticeable.
After devotions we went down for the engine room team briefing. That done I was given my engine room induction (basically safety drills and what all the different alarm signals mean). The engine room is an amazing place – I’ll try to get some photos posted, but they will never be able to convey how noisy it is – and that was without the main engines running. There’s also the heat and smell of oil, diesel and heavy oil everywhere.
The first job I was given to do (and this will make my wife laugh) was to vacuum up a load of collected soot from a leaking exhaust manifold and then to tighten up the bolts on a newly replaced section. This I managed to complete without dropping any spanners into the bowels of the engine, which I was rather pleased about.
My next job, which as it turned out, was to take most of the rest of the day, was to try to find a leak in the emergency bilge system. This, Paul said, would give me a real taste of life in the engine room! The bilge pipes run under the floor plates of the engine room, so the only way to look for leaks is to get a plate up, and crawl into the space below. This is dark, dirty, smelly and cramped. I discovered that I am rather less keen on small enclosed spaces than I thought! We weren’t able to find any obvious leaks in the first section we checked, nor the second, but in the auxilliary engine room, we found a place that had been temporarily patched and that had started to leak again. The patch was removed and the pipe cleaned and prepared for welding. One of the welders then set to work to weld on a patch. While he did this we got on with trying to fix a stuck water valve. While we were doing this, the welder came running in to tell us that whilst trying to weld on the patch, the pipe had burst and was leaking bilge water all over the place, which was obviously bad news! We then spent most of the rest of the afternoon clearing up the mess and collecting 50 or so litres of filthy bilge water up from the leaking pipe. By the time we’d finished that, it was time to stop work for the day and go and get cleaned up for dinner.
After dinner, Paul took me on an extended tour of the ship – it’s amazing how much is going on – I’ll post pictures when I can and I’ll try to describe it all a bit tomorrow. Right now I’m going to try to get some sleep. Something tells me that I’m not going to have to try too hard!