Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

Wayne, do they even use tugs for that anymore? Or is it all done by bow thrusters?

Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

On Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:38:36 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:

Wayne, do they even use tugs for that anymore? Or is it all done by bow thrusters?

===

The trend seems to be that ferrys and cruise ships are using
thrusters, both bow and stern. They do a lot of docking and undocking
so avoiding tug boats saves a lot of money. Cargo ships and large
military vessels are still using tugs for the most part.

Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

Yes expensive. When I had my old Chris craft on Carlyle lake the dock club had a cookout going on and I got acquainted with a guy that worked for a tow company out of St. Louis. They had a small fleet of barge engines. That ran the ICW. He said those boats averaged about $18-2300. An hr depending...

And that was in about 1985.

Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

On Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:38:36 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:

Wayne, do they even use tugs for that anymore? Or is it all done by bow thrusters?

The tug boat union ;-)

I suppose in some cases wind and tide will be too much for thrusters
and no captain wants that liability. It is the same reason they take
on pilots.

Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

wrote:
On Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:38:36 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:

Wayne, do they even use tugs for that anymore? Or is it all done by bow thrusters?

The tug boat union ;-)

I suppose in some cases wind and tide will be too much for thrusters
and no captain wants that liability. It is the same reason they take
on pilots.

Acquaintance runs a tractor tug in SF Bay. He makes $450k a year. So fees
have to cover crew and a multimillion dollar tug, most ships are at least
escorted by tug when going under any of the bridges and a couple other
places. Both because of danger of loss of steering and power and fast
currents.

Nice Docking in Nice, France
 

On Wed, 23 Sep 2015 15:32:34 -0400, wrote:

On Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:38:36 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:

Wayne, do they even use tugs for that anymore? Or is it all done by bow thrusters?

The tug boat union ;-)

I suppose in some cases wind and tide will be too much for thrusters
and no captain wants that liability. It is the same reason they take
on pilots.

===

Use of a pilot is not entirely up to the captain. Here are the rules
for Florida:

http://floridapilots.com/wordpress/w...20Document.pdf