[esailor Team]

Chief Mates Unlimited Oral
Examiner – Adam Stratford
Candidate – Experienced Seafarer route (Yachts)
Result – Pass (1h30min)
Let into meeting 10 minutes early. Had some video issues and both examiner and candidate logged out and issue was resolved. Started with an introduction and said that I should make myself comfortable and suggested I may take my jacket and tie off. Went over housekeeping rules, said that we have a large syllabus to cover so this exam will take at least 1h30min. If we lost connection it will not be a fail however the exam would need to be rescheduled. You will be examined as CM Unlimited and on occasion Master 3000. I gave a tour of the room and this was fairly thorough. Was told only first answer would be considered so he warned me to answer carefully. Said the exam would start soon and asked if I needed anything as I would not be able to leave the exam at any time.
Exam started
o Joining a general cargo ship as a newly qualified chief mate, vessel is at anchor, please tell me about the process? (Went through the full process including all handover topics and contents of handover notes)
o So you’ve mentioned the general condition of the ship, as you’d gone around the bow you noticed one of the anchors is missing what would be your concern? (After full joining discussion was over he asked me this)
o On handover outgoing CM has not organised anything. What would you need to do regarding the missing anchor?
o Company has decided to use this as a time to conduct annuals and go to dry dock. How would you go about organising dry dock in Singapore?
o What are the dangers of dry docking and explain the process to me? (This question lasted a long time as I was fairly detailed for the entire process basing it on my experience)
o What annual surveys would you expect to carry out in the dry dock and what would class be checking? (Basically and certification question and survey intervals)
o Master has decided to go on holiday during dry dock so you are now master. 3 AB’s go ashore and get drunk resulting in one going to jail. Authorities do not want to release him what would you do as master?
o AB has now been allowed to join the vessel again what would your actions be? (Merchant navy code of conduct)
o Now the 2nd officer has seriously injured himself doing some hazardous work onboard. He has gone to hospital and won’t be able to come back. Actions? (Was about root cause analysis. Safety officer duties with regards to accident investigation and changes to SMS then led onto SMD)
o What would you do with his belongings?
o Ok what else goes in the Narrative of OLB?
o New second officer joins and he’s not sailed to Europe before. He has asked you for assistance with passage planning. What advice would you give him for this passage? (Standard APEM and publications carried, then went into Met for the area as well as special areas for MARPOL and load line zones)
o So off the coast of Indian you receive a call from MRCC that a fishing vessel has capsized and you are the closest vessel. You are directed to the scene what are your actions as CM? (Preps for survivors/SAR)
o You arrive on scene and cannot see the FV, Actions? (IAMSAR and search patterns + Additional lookout duties)
o Ok that situation is now resolved. At your next port of call PSC comes onboard what would you expect? (Types of inspections + MOU’s)
o They have concerns about your SMC how could you prove it was valid? (Initially went down the route of objective evidence. He reworded and asked what is contained on the back of SMC then I answered regarding three month leeway for intermediate. This was what he was looking for.)
This was the general flow of the exam. Several questions im sure I have forgotten however was surprised he didn’t ask anything particular about cargo. Worth considering additional precautions for joining at anchor. He asked a fair bit on crew management as master and dry dock preparations. Felt important to know what each certificate is for in particular and what would be included in the survey.
Next came COLREGS. I was surprised by this as I felt we hadn’t covered many topics in the talky questions but it was thorough and we had spent over an hour on them. Pretty simple COLREGS questions.
Smarty board (PPT slides) please give me details of the vessels and action.
PDV crossing Port, PDV crossing STBD, RAM crossing Port, TSS who can use separation Zone, who can use inshore traffic zone, TSS PDV crossing from STBD you are following lane.
Radar plotting was more of a discussion. He said that I could use my radar plotting sheet to plot or just explain what was happening on screen. I went with the latter. The first was a video of 3 blips increasing in range which is strait-forward. The second radar plot was 3 blips port bow 0 CPA actions in restricted visibility? What would the other vessel do? (Had to transpose own vector to get a rough idea of aspect. He was happy just with rough ideas)
Buoyage was simply PPT with with no top marks. Wanted full descriptions including lights and then actions. South cardinal mark. Ok heading east what would you do for this? Then IALA B STBD lateral and preferred channel to port.
We finished here. Exam was very fair and followed the general direction of most other reports however focused a lot of time and attention on Dry-docking and crew management. Surprisingly no cargo related questions. He would always start with a general question, allow me to explain the whole process and then focused on details he wanted with follow up questions.
Try your best to find a group to discuss past papers and practice answering questions. When self studying say it out loud. I think having confidence during the exam plays a bit part and the more practice you have before hand the better. All the best.

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