>>1745280Tugfren, I’m not talking about RFPNW/RFPEW. You’re an AB with RFPNW sailing for NOAA. Do you have OICNW? Did you get it without NOAA programs designed to train NOAA Mariners?
STCW III/ RFPEW requires $25,000 worth of classes and a couple of months in a classroom, and these classes aren’t available in a timeframe where they can all be done in one cohesive block of time off the boat. You gotta schedule them out every couple months.
Then you also face this catch 22 where in order to get STCW OICEW you need to have sailed under an STCW engineer, so if you’re the only engineer on something like a coastwise tug, you’re screwed. “Just take a single hitch job as QMED on a bigger vessel to get your STCW sea time” isn’t practical when you’re supporting a family and mortgage back home.
I have Chief engineer limited 1600 tons unlimited horsepower but I’m not seeing how I can get OICEW without these damn classes and specific STCW sea time. There used to be a way to demonstrate competence in front of an STCW evaluator but the language in the CFR now seems to require the classes. I’ve sat down and gone over it with an REC commander or whatever the title is and he was surprised and all he could say was “send a packet to the NMC and see what they say”.
I’ve had a 30 year master and SIU rep tell me something similar, basically go sea lawyer on them and prove my demonstrated competence via my decade of sea time and duties I’ve filled, and hit them with some shit about impediment of my livelihood etc, he claims they fold under that type of legalese pretty often.
It’s not a simple thing, brüder.
