6/9/10 The Williamson Maneuver and Smells of the Sea

I had a revelation today. One often does not realize how potent the sense
of smell is. It can no doubt repulse, seduce, inspire hunger, or
inspiration. What I have come to realize is that each location on the
ship has a different smell which you can use to identify it.

The easiest identifying smell is on the level below the maindeck where
they prepare the garbage. That is probably the easiest smell to identify..
Others are perhaps a bit more subtle. If you are outside, and dependent
on your location, you can catch a waft of the exhaust of the ship which
has a smooth, noxious element to it not unlike a diesel truck brought to
the fifth power. Likewise, the sweetest smelling area of the ship would
be if you go forward on the maindeck. The air always seems to be the
purest there.

The cadet mess deck, which I walk through often enough, has is own unique
odor, that while not unpleasant, is highly institutional.

In addition to these common smells, there are intermittent smells
dependant on the work going on. This could be that smell I described a
couple of weeks ago of rotten eggs and rust (probably sulfur), as well as
paint and various industrial smells. The library has its own smell –
decidedly neutral and perhaps a bit bookish.

Another interesting fact I found out today is that one cannot simply stop
a ship like a car. In order to stop a ship, you need to have about 2
miles (or more depending on your speed). So if something comes up in your
way, you can’t simply hit the brakes so to speak. Rather, you need to
maneuver the ship around the obstacle.

That is why among other reasons you need to have watches, and you need to
keep ships at a safe distance. The larger the vessel, the harder it is to
stop it. And how do you stop it? By reversing the engines, yet you can
imagine how much power it would take to stop something as big as an oil
tanker.

Now, imagine this situation and somebody goes overboard. The best you can
do is throw them one of those life rings and execute a circle (called a
Williamson circle). The person in the water has to wait until the ship
can complete the circle and hopefully they can fish you out.

With that said, the ship, smells and all, is now back in the Aegean and
heading pretty much on the same path we came in. We ended up getting a
late start, having been piloted out of Piraeus at about 1330. We have
plenty of time though and I believe we will be doing our circles soon.

Fair Winds and Following Seas,
Joe