The owner shared a copy of the ticket with us.
The ladder regulation hadn't been enforced previously — boarding teams never asked for a ladder during numerous boardings, he said, and no one ever asked to see one during dockside exams.
The boat involved in the Jan. 21 boarding was a 58-footer fishing cod in the Bering Sea out of False Pass. The boarding team was from the Coast Guard cutter Alex Haley.
The boarding team told the skipper they were "starting now" to enforce the ladder requirement, the fishing vessel owner said.
A pilot ladder is a flexible ladder lowered over the side of a vessel to aid people coming aboard.
Such ladders are helpful, as it's always perilous to climb from boat to boat.
This recent enforcement action begs the question: Are we seeing a crackdown on the pilot ladder requirement?
The vessel owner noted that pilot ladders are bulky, and expensive.
Scott Wilwert, the Coast Guard's fishing vessel safety program manager for Alaska, told us he was not aware of any big enforcement push on pilot ladders.
But fishermen should be aware that if their vessel has more than 4 feet of freeboard, federal regulations require a boarding ladder to assist law enforcement personnel and fishery observers, Wilwert said.
Freeboard can change considerably depending on whether the fishing vessel is tanked down, he noted.
The False Pass vessel had a freeboard of 5 feet, 6 inches, the ticket said.
5 comments:
Freeboard is a different thing than height to the top of the rail. I guarantee this 58 footer did not have 5.5 feet of freeboard.
It’s where water can “freely” board the vessel…it could be the rail or not depending on deck configuration
Federal regulations at 50 CFR § 600.730 say:
"For the purposes of this section 'freeboard' means the working distance between the top rail of the gunwale of a vessel and the water's surface. Where cut-outs are provided in the bulwarks for the purpose of boarding personnel, freeboard means the distance between the threshold of the bulwark cut-out and the water's surface."
Honestly, boarding ladders have been a big deal for the CG for decades. I recall them dinging us over minor fraying of insignificant lines, and this was 20 years ago. And, I remember spells of fines going out 'till everyone got their ladders up to snuff. Given the possible consequences, this seems totally reasonable to me, and really nothing new.
Maybe one of the 10 guys on the Coast guard skiff could carry a ladder instead of a machine gun?
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