Ships of Shame

Summer was red hot for the Australian office of the International Transport Workers' Federation.

Floating Disaster

Burnie 26/2/07: The Maritime Union declared a log ship unsafe, branding it a 'floating anchor'. MUA Branch Secretary Mick Wickham told Channel 9 national news the Italian registered Sider Blu was in appalling condition with dangerously decaying decks, broken toilets, no hot water and only one washing machine for 18 crew.

He said the ship would not be loaded with its cargo of logs or allowed to leave the Port of Burnie until it was repaired.

"If it was loaded and allowed to sail it would be a floating disaster waiting to happen," said Mick Wickham. "The International Transport Federation will do everything it can to ensure that the vessel reaches a standard that will not compromise the safety of the vessel and its crew at sea. And that also includes the safety of our wharf labour that have to load the rotten thing."

Ship Ablaze

Newcastle 9/2/07: The Bahamas-flagged Baltimar Boreas caught fire after loading volatile ammonium nitrate sparking new calls for a crackdown on flag of convenience shipping carrying dangerous cargo on our coastal trade. The ship had to be towed back to port after the fire was extinguished.

Lloyds List reports it was the second incident in the last three months that has involved the compromising of the explosive chemical after an incident in November where up to 400 kg of the substance disappeared from a rail siding.

Only days earlier the ITF was involved in a stand-off with the captain of the Alpha Action (5/2/07) in Newcastle, after the captain breached the International Ship and Port facility Security code and refused to allow the ITF on board to address crew concerns at Newcastle's Kooragang Number 5 coal berth.

The ITF had been asked to investigate claims that the bulker had been in poor condition and that its crew was being mistreated. The captain backed down the following day.

Crew exploited

Geelong 29/1/07: The ITF won $90,000 in back pay for a crew of 45 seafarers on board the Australian Wheat Board-chartered ship Caravos Horizon.

ITF inspectors secured the settlement with Athens company Iason Hellenic Shipping before the ship took on wheat at the GrainCorp berth.

Federation co-ordinator Dean Summers said the company had tried to hide the wage scam by keeping a doctored wage book.

The ITF head told the Geelong Advertiser the company tried to pass off "a couple of bits of paper" as wage bookkeeping. He said the fake records showed beefed-up wages to the mostly-Filipino crew, many of whom had worked for two years before receiving leave.