🌊Voyage of Misery

 From Biswajit Basu:

That is perhaps the harsh training of the sea.  It takes time to learn to hear hysterical people describing an unfortunate situation that you are in and knowing that there can be no help as you are hundreds of miles from the nearest help.  Not a twitch  nor a muscle in your face must move lest you let your juniors also know the panic in your mind. Just a hint of a smile that all is ok and we'll solve the problem. (Not easy when your ship is sinking in a N. Atlantic gale!)

(Blogger Note: North Atlantic is infamous in the maritime world for its savage storms!)

That was, in fact, the context of a true story when we sprung a leak in the middle of howling winds and mountainous season in a North Atlantic Winter crossing from Canada.  We somehow made it to Ceuta (opposite Gibraltar) for repairs.  My only thought was that, in those stormy conditions, if we had to abandon ship how would we save my 50 officers and crew.  But all I could do was pretend I would control the leak when, initially, I could not even find where it was!

My Second Engineer D'Souza found it in the Engine Room.  The body of the main seawater valve was cracked.  While people were frantically searching, I was watching the water level rise ominously in the Engine Room.  Very soon it would reach the level of the Main Engine and I would have to turn it off.  With the Main Engine off, the ship would turn according to the winds and waves.  Once those heavy seas caught us broadside, the ship would topple over easily already with so much water inside and stability seriously compromised.  In that state I would have to evacuate the Engine room and await the Abandon Ship Alarm by the captain.  By that time there would be very little hope in saving the ship.  And everyone would be left to save himself in the way he thought fit.

It was the Jaladhruv for this story.  

_{(Picture Credit: Fred Miller II, ShipSpotting.com)}

(Biswajit Basu, 2021, on seeing the above picture: “What a lovely ship she was. Built with German precision and reliability.”)

It was also my last trip on foreign going ships.  In a letter I got in Port Suez, I came to know of Ma's heart attack.  In the next port, Aden, I heard of Daddy's injury.  It was a never ending voyage of misery after misery.  The mental strain was too much.  So I resigned.

The company Scindia was wound up in the 2000's and all the ship's sold.  Now all we have are  memories of a fantastic company.

(Scindia Line, Wikipedia)