Listening to Dean Martin - Ain't That A Kick in the Head
Well. It was a rather interesting night patrol. For starters, since basically the rest of my crew set were breaking their fast, I had to prepare the boat alone and for the first time ever, it actually went very well. Finally, my skills are improving after so many lousy attempts. Our boats are really advanced. So advanced that just turning them on is a challenge in itself.
Strangely, exactly 36 hours after doing my morning shift, I ended up at CLIFFORD PIER again. I was there on monday morning at around 8 plus. The CITY at night is as nice as ever. One great thing about doing patrols with SI Norman is that we get to go inside the bay and check out all the boats as well as facade of the city - both by day as well as by night.
Later, we performed one spot check on a supply ship anchored just off Keppel Harbour. This other NSman as well as I boarded the other vessel to just check on their vessel and to my surprise, it was a very well equipped and well mantained boat. So good that in fact, it would be easy to mistake its interiors for a luxury cruise ship. Even their toilet was of higher standard than ours!
However, when me and the other guy tried to jump across the supply ship back onto our own patrol craft. Both of us nearly fell into the water. The deck was VERY slippery - and we were wearing safety shoes, which are supposed to give grip even on oily surfaces. The surface of their deck was only WET and it was like trying to walk on ice.
As both me and the other guy jumped across, both of us struck our shins against the side railings and had a hard landing. It was made worst since some other giant merchant vessel, which was totally black in color, suddenly appeared out of nowhere and their backwash just made us have a rather bad landing. The pain in my shin subsided shortly after, but for my other friend, he had quite a bad bruise on his shin. SI told us to wear our lifejackets next time we went outside, especially in the darkness as we might just fall into the water given that the area we were doing checks on was frequented by by very large cargo ships.
It ended up later that when the entire crew was talking about all those "pantang" - not that I am superstitious or anything, but practically everyone in the team observes that they "don't say certain things". So it ended up that the crew started talking about who died when and where in Tracom and where all the tombstones could be found around the Police Academy. And the they just recounted their previous ghastly encounters during their time of training in Tracom.
Then our starboard engine caught fire.
Thank God that the MPC prepared us for just such a situation. So I was particularly worried or anything. We just shut off the engine and proceeded with caution into the engine room and discoverd that the whole engine was smoking very badly. So we opened up the engine cover on the deck and let the smoke ventilate off. I guess it didn't occur to me that I might just die or that our boat might just explode. Nevertheless, we ended up on patrol using just our port side engine solely for the rest of the night and morning.
We were still in the mood to eat and chit-chat later on after the fire had subsided. So I treated the crew set to pizza. We got the guys back at the base to bring the pizza to us and we proceeded back to base to pick up the wonderful pizza that so certainly brightened up our night. Then I just went into the cabin for my rest.
When I woke up at about 4 a.m plus in the morning, the guys were preparing to start their fast, so they just gave me the remainder of their porridge, the stable food that they all shared before fasting started at about 5.20 in the morning. In the end, I had like almost 7 or 8 bags worth of tit bits and porridge for my "breakfast".
Couldn't eat. Just ended up steering the boat the whole way from Kusu Island all the way to Mano Buoy, followed by a high speed cruise at about 14 knots towards the South Marina portside marker beacon. My previous fastest crusing speed was only around 9 knots. This is about the same speed as those small boats you see moored at Clifford pier. After which we spot checked another tugboat and proceeded to visit the CITY again.
I knocked out soon after. I was so tired and just could not stay awake, so I reclined the chair in the helmsroom and slept through. Its not nice I guess, but I think SI also didn't mind knowing that I was half-dead already. He just asked me to "carry on sleeping". I've done more or less my "share" of the work by steering the boat from about 4 in the morning till almost 8. So I think SI was rather satisfied with my work.
We were relieved SO LATE from duty by the other team. But nevermind. Its ok. I got to sleep more.
I'm going to sleep now...Tonight, I'm going to Church again! Woo!
Well. It was a rather interesting night patrol. For starters, since basically the rest of my crew set were breaking their fast, I had to prepare the boat alone and for the first time ever, it actually went very well. Finally, my skills are improving after so many lousy attempts. Our boats are really advanced. So advanced that just turning them on is a challenge in itself.
Strangely, exactly 36 hours after doing my morning shift, I ended up at CLIFFORD PIER again. I was there on monday morning at around 8 plus. The CITY at night is as nice as ever. One great thing about doing patrols with SI Norman is that we get to go inside the bay and check out all the boats as well as facade of the city - both by day as well as by night.
Later, we performed one spot check on a supply ship anchored just off Keppel Harbour. This other NSman as well as I boarded the other vessel to just check on their vessel and to my surprise, it was a very well equipped and well mantained boat. So good that in fact, it would be easy to mistake its interiors for a luxury cruise ship. Even their toilet was of higher standard than ours!
However, when me and the other guy tried to jump across the supply ship back onto our own patrol craft. Both of us nearly fell into the water. The deck was VERY slippery - and we were wearing safety shoes, which are supposed to give grip even on oily surfaces. The surface of their deck was only WET and it was like trying to walk on ice.
As both me and the other guy jumped across, both of us struck our shins against the side railings and had a hard landing. It was made worst since some other giant merchant vessel, which was totally black in color, suddenly appeared out of nowhere and their backwash just made us have a rather bad landing. The pain in my shin subsided shortly after, but for my other friend, he had quite a bad bruise on his shin. SI told us to wear our lifejackets next time we went outside, especially in the darkness as we might just fall into the water given that the area we were doing checks on was frequented by by very large cargo ships.
It ended up later that when the entire crew was talking about all those "pantang" - not that I am superstitious or anything, but practically everyone in the team observes that they "don't say certain things". So it ended up that the crew started talking about who died when and where in Tracom and where all the tombstones could be found around the Police Academy. And the they just recounted their previous ghastly encounters during their time of training in Tracom.
Then our starboard engine caught fire.
Thank God that the MPC prepared us for just such a situation. So I was particularly worried or anything. We just shut off the engine and proceeded with caution into the engine room and discoverd that the whole engine was smoking very badly. So we opened up the engine cover on the deck and let the smoke ventilate off. I guess it didn't occur to me that I might just die or that our boat might just explode. Nevertheless, we ended up on patrol using just our port side engine solely for the rest of the night and morning.
We were still in the mood to eat and chit-chat later on after the fire had subsided. So I treated the crew set to pizza. We got the guys back at the base to bring the pizza to us and we proceeded back to base to pick up the wonderful pizza that so certainly brightened up our night. Then I just went into the cabin for my rest.
When I woke up at about 4 a.m plus in the morning, the guys were preparing to start their fast, so they just gave me the remainder of their porridge, the stable food that they all shared before fasting started at about 5.20 in the morning. In the end, I had like almost 7 or 8 bags worth of tit bits and porridge for my "breakfast".
Couldn't eat. Just ended up steering the boat the whole way from Kusu Island all the way to Mano Buoy, followed by a high speed cruise at about 14 knots towards the South Marina portside marker beacon. My previous fastest crusing speed was only around 9 knots. This is about the same speed as those small boats you see moored at Clifford pier. After which we spot checked another tugboat and proceeded to visit the CITY again.
I knocked out soon after. I was so tired and just could not stay awake, so I reclined the chair in the helmsroom and slept through. Its not nice I guess, but I think SI also didn't mind knowing that I was half-dead already. He just asked me to "carry on sleeping". I've done more or less my "share" of the work by steering the boat from about 4 in the morning till almost 8. So I think SI was rather satisfied with my work.
We were relieved SO LATE from duty by the other team. But nevermind. Its ok. I got to sleep more.
I'm going to sleep now...Tonight, I'm going to Church again! Woo!
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