Still a Pollywog

 I have a little bit of catching up to do, again. We arrived in Singapore 10 days ago, and remained at an “anchored” location off the coast of Singapore for about 4 days to resupply (fuel, food, equipment, etc) and change out crews. It was a big tease for me to sail by the Singapore skyline without the ability to visit the city.

In Singapore, a group of small wooden boats followed our supply/crew change boats around selling cigarettes and scavenging the waters.

6 days ago, we departed from Singapore and made our way through the Strait of Malacca to the Indian Ocean. We are now sailing across the Indian Ocean in transit to Cape Town. Two nights ago we crossed the equator into the southern hemisphere. There is an interesting tradition among seamen surrounding the crossing of the equator. Anyone that has never crossed the equator on a ship/vessel is considered a pollywog. When a sailor crosses the equator for the first time, his status changes from pollywog to shellback (but not before being “initiated” of course). I am currently awaiting King Neptune’s approval to be officially considered a shellback. I will appear before King Neptune in court tomorrow at the initiation ceremony to answer for my charges. There have been a number of rumors floating around about King Neptune's traditional requirements for achieving the shellback status including swimming through the whale’s belly (aka slop tank) and kissing the baby’s belly. I’m not entirely sure what to expect here…. but I know there are no babies on board.

Up until Singapore, I was the only operations engineer on board. In Singapore, another operations engineer, Doug, joined our crew and I have moved to the night shift. My shift is from 18:00 to 06:00, and Doug works the 06:00 to 18:00 shift. Having two of us on board has helped a lot with the workload, but there is still more than enough work to keep us working beyond our shifts. It has been an adjustment to working nights, but it has made it much easier to communicate home to Kendall with the time zone differences. It is a little different at first seeing spaghetti or chicken for “breakfast”, but it's pretty easy to get used to.

The galley.

 My bedroom, I share a room with Doug.

The Deepwater Invictus anchored in S. Korea before we left.

Views from the top of the derrick.

Enjoying beautiful sunsets and sunrises is one thing that I really enjoy while working on the rig. The sunsets and sunrises throughout the voyage have been spectacular! When things are not too busy, there is often a group of us watching it together.

Full Speed Ahead....Finally

Well, things didn't go exactly as hoped for in my last blog entry. I was able to move onboard the drill ship this past Friday, and the drill ship met all minimum requirements for transit yesterday. Today, 3/24/14 at 7:00AM we finally set sail for Singapore. It has been a hectic past few days aboard the Deepwater Invictus as crews and personnel have been scrambling to meet departure requirements. My main role as an operations engineer is optimization, and one of my tasks is to track performance and timing of our operations. So I have been busy setting up my work station, adjusting to my new team, gathering and tracking information from all of the departments onboard, planning for upcoming equipment/system tests that must be performed during transit, attending regular safety and operational meetings throughout the day, and trying to find my way around this new rig. Things will slow down, but for now I feel like I can never fully catch up on all there is to do. All that aside, it is great to be moving forward!

So let me try to catch you guys with a few highlights over the last few days. As a last hoorah in Okpo, one of my supervisors took our team out to dinner at a small, unassuming local restaurant that served large, imposing crabs from abroad.  Crabs so large you truly needed two hands to pick them up.

Two of these monsters left all 6 of us in a crab saturated state of contentment. It was definitely a memorable experience for me. The following day, I  packed my bags and drove to the harbor to board a crew change boat and make my way out to the Invictus, anchored a short ways offshore. 

The rig crew lowered a gangway from the main deck to our crew boat that allowed us to climb aboard.

In addition to managing operations, we also have to suffer through things like cake cutting ceremonies. This morning after the ship departed, Transocean and BHPB representatives came together for a cake cutting ceremony in the galley to celebrate the milestone. 

This was a fairly quick rundown, but I need to call it a night here. More to come! The map below shows the route we will be following in transit to Singapore.

Sunset view while anchored offshore of Okpo.

Also, I was looking in all the wrong places...Before I departed, I finally found the local gym in Okpo, located a couple kilometers up the trail to one of the highest peaks in the area.

Over and out.

-Clint

Slow Start

Hi All,

I started a new blog to provide updates on my voyage from South Korea. All design credit goes to the beautiful Kendall Hanna. I do not know how interesting my life will be for readers once I am en route, but I will give this blog a shot.

I have now been in Okpo, Korea for a little over a week in preparation to travel on board the Deepwater Invictus (our new drill ship) as it sails to the Gulf of Mexico where it will be operated. Okpo is a city on the island of Geoje located off the southern coast of South Korea (see red circle in the image below).

The Invictus was scheduled to depart mid-last week, but was delayed due to various complications. Tomorrow I will finally board the Invictus for the first time and I will remain on board until the final equipment testing and punchlist items have been completed. Below is a model rendering of the Deepwater Invictus drill ship. The boat is currently anchored a short ways offshore, so I am scheduled to meet at the docks at 10:00AM tomorrow morning to take a short boat trip out to the rig.

While waiting, I have been working in the BHP Billiton office at the DSME (Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering) shipyard as well as exploring the city of Okpo a bit. DSME is one of the largest shipbuilders in the world, and it is just one of the shipyards on this island. The shipbuilding industry here supports the existence of Okpo and other the towns here on the island of Geoje. I have enjoyed the opportunity to learn about the shipyard here and experience the environment. On my first day at the office, I was working on my laptop when I heard what I can only describe as Disneyland-theme-park-like music playing across the shipyard. And this music plays on and off throughout the day, with intervals of 2-3 songs a round. Some times when the music plays (and I have not identified the pattern quite yet), the workers will halt their work and gather to stretch together as the music plays. While this may be a morale booster for the DSME workers, it is quite a comical experience for the guys in our group (...and a little aggravating to some of the old grumps in the group). All of the DSME workers use bikes to get around the expansive shipyard. Without a bike, it is worth driving to get around or using the bus system within the shipyard. Below is a short video clip of the bustle in the mornings. I may not be shooting from the best angle because I was attempting to be inconspicuous.

DSME Shipyard

In my free time, I have explored the nearby trails that wind along the hillside and coastline. There is a particular trail that I have enjoyed that starts along a stilted boardwalk, guides through wooded hills, and then finishes at an old war monument of a naval battle that took place off the coast of Geoje. There were a number of good vantage points to view the shipyard and town from along the way.

City of Okpo

Stilted boardwalk along the coastline

Shots along the trails

War Monument along the trail (Victory Park)

View of the bay

I typically eat meals out with a few of my co-workers, or just buy groceries for meals. Because of all the foreign contracts at the shipyards with companies such as BHPB, there is a large foreign population here resulting in a sort of cultural melting pot. The restaurants in my area seem to cater to foreigners, serving all types of cuisines. So my diet has been quite different than I imagined....ranging from cajun gumbo to quesadillas to kimchi. One common type of restaurant here serves raw meat for you to cook yourself on a grill in the middle of a table. The cook-it-yourself restaurant some co-workers and I visited served two options; ribs and spicy ribs. So I opted for the spicy ribs, but boy it was spicy. I had to take a few breathers mid meal to assist with the heat exchange process. But it was one of those spicy flavors that just tastes so good while it burns. We had a good time with it.

Ribs grilling in the center of our table

Kimchi

Rice bowl and assorted "goodies"

I'm going to end it here for now. If all goes well, I will board the Invictus tomorrow and the journey will be underway later this week. Please send up a prayer for Kendall and I that this show will hit the road soon, it was discouraging this past week to learn about the complications and delays that will prolong our time apart.

-Clint