Panorama general

The training and certification of VTS operators in India is not in accordance with the V103 (IALA 2005) followed in the UK and across Europe. The MahaDevi VTS operators have not received any training in Maritime English, they are not aware of the Standard Maritime Communication Phrases (SMCP), Standard Maritime Navigation Vocabulary (SMNV) or SEASPEAK. They do not refer to their services as Information Service (INS), Traffic Organisation Service (TOS) or Navigation Assistance Service (NAS) (IALA, V-103 terminology) and do not use VTS technical phraseology such as ‘situational awareness’ etc.

The background of the VTS operators helps to explain this further. The VTS operators recruited into MahaDevi are from two separate streams; ex-defence and ex-merchant Navy.

A VTS operator recruited could be an ex-Indian Navy seaman or an ex-merchant Navy Radio Officer⁸³. The training background and the certification for the two streams are vastly different. The ex-defence personnel have been trained by the Signal Corps of the armed forces and the ex-merchant Navy radio officers have a certificate in radio communication from an Indian Maritime College.

“During my time at sea, they had started the training in Maritime English for officers…

all procedures followed here are standard international radio telephony procedures.”

(Interview, VTSO 5)

For both streams of VTS operators, the main focus of their training had been on operating radio equipment and international radio-telephony communication procedures. The focus of their training had not been on the holistic provision of VTS services. The MahaDevi VTS operators had received on-the-job training, some of them had even gone abroad to the office of the Europe based VTS provider who had installed the VTS system in MahaDevi, but the training had largely focussed on the equipment of the VTS system and not on the provision of VTS as a service embedded in the larger context of risk, safety, service provision, society, environment and legal liability. From late 2013 and 2014 onwards, training in India for VTS operators will be on the lines of IALA V-103 and steps are being taken for the provision of such training in the country (GOI 2013).

83 Currently this position does not exist on-board as the Radio Officers were made redundant by most companies as external communication was entrusted to officers of the bridge team.

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To nuance VTSO training, I take the example of Navigation Assistance Service (NAS)⁸⁴ provision in the port as it is a safety critical service and exploring it can reveal insights about the training of VTSOs and the practice of providing the service as it compares with IMO (1997b) guidelines. NAS is to be provided when requested by a ship or when deemed necessary by the VTS in the interest of safety. It is usually required in difficult navigation situations or when a vessel is experiencing defects or deficiencies (see IMO 1997b; IALA 2008, 2012).

When the VTS is authorized to issue instructions to vessels, these instructions should be result-oriented only, leaving the details of execution, such as course to be steered or engine manoeuvres to be executed, to the master or pilot on board the vessel. Care should be taken that VTS operations do not encroach upon the master's responsibility for safe navigation…(IMO 1997b, p. 7)

The MahaDevi VTS provides the NAS service, when required, but is very direct in its approach such as providing an exact course to steer (example 4.20). This practice diverges from the IMO (1997b) recommendations which suggests that the instructions should be result oriented and execution should be left to decision makers on-board. In the example below the VTSO saw the direction vector of Michael move out of the channel where the depth of water was less and in the interest of safety gave it a course to steer to come back into the channel.

Example 4.20: VTS; NAS provision 62. VTS – Michael, VTS

63. VTS – Michael, Michael, VTS 64. Michael – VTS, VTS, Michael,

65. VTS – Yeah Michael, what is your course now?

66. Michael – two, nine, zero (.) two, nine, zero 67. VTS – alter to two, five, zero (.) two, five, zero 68. Michael – two, five, zero, okay

69. VTS – yeah, steer two, five, zero

Two VTS operators were in the office. VTSO 5 spoke to Michael on the radio and VTSO 2 turned to me and said, “He asked her to stay in the channel. They are supposed to have a chart on board but she is not complying”. After the call, VTSO 5 said, “We are not supposed to give any particular course because we are not knowing whether

84 The MahaDevi VTS operators provide NAS services according to the interaction on the VHF radio. However, the VTS manual uploaded on the MahaDevi port website in 2013, two years after my fieldwork state that the port provides INS and TOS services and does not list NAS. A year after my fieldwork in 2011, navigation guidelines were uploaded on the port website which make the first mention of the VTS online, whereas the service has been in the port since the late 1990s (year of installation withheld to preserve anonymity).

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there is a fishing boat or anything is there or not. So we are forced to give a course because she is not bothered to maintain the course” (field note, 21 Dec 2010)

.

Noteworthy is that VTSO 5 says that they are not supposed to give a course to steer to ships.

IMO (1997b) guidelines require that VTS instructions should not encroach upon on-board execution while the VTSO reasons that he should not give a course to steer as there could be other craft in the vicinity he is not aware of, but he was forced to give a course in the interest of safety. There are also issues of legal liability to be addressed if something happens as a consequence of following instructions provided by the VTSO. NAS provision in MahaDevi highlights the training gap of VTS operators with respect to the IALA-V103 and the divergence of their practice from IMO (1997b) guidelines for VTS. NAS provision with explicit execution instructions is utilised by VTS operators to ensure safe traffic movement.

The direct, matter-of-fact instructions of MahaDevi VTS operators are in stark contrast to the verbose utterances of the Singapore VTSO (see Maersk Kendal, Page 8) and the reluctance of the Swedish VTSO to communicate any more information than required by protocol/mandate which could not prevent the grounding of the Stena Danica (SAIB 2010; Brodje et al. 2013).

In line with this finding (direct micro managing utterances), training in line with the IALA V-103 for the VTS operators is recommended to appreciate the broader context of VTS service provision and appreciate the legal aspects of their utterances (see chapter 8). The purpose of my research is to reveal the in situ practices and it is for the port authority and navigation experts to evaluate the impact of direct NAS instructions (example 4.20) on safety. The directness of the MahaDevi VTSOs also comes across in their instructions pertaining to anchoring (explored in chapter 5).

The Harbour Master believes that navigators are more suitable in the VTS office as they would know where the ship’s master was coming from (see Lutzhoft and Bruno 2009). The Harbour Master cannot recruit experienced navigators for the VTS office given the budget constraints he is under and VTS operators believe that no navigator would like to work on a clerical grade and a nominal salary. The (perceived inferior) training of VTS operators accounts, in part, for the performance of rank, status and hierarchy on the port radio (see chapter 7).

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The MahaDevi VTS operators manage marine traffic in a complex environment in one of the busiest ports in the country. They feel that the workload, stress and pressure of their job is not compensated by their clerical grade and salary. Their status is lower than that of officers in the port. Sometimes they feel pressurised, belittled, humbled, embarrassed or irritated by the internal communication taking over the main VHF channel when ideally, communicating with ships on VHF channel 15 should be their domain. Chapter 7 discusses the micro politics of port communication in detail. In the following sub-section, I turn to the Dock Master who is a very large presence on the marine radio.