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Port Houston,TX 2 Crew Members Killed In Ship Fire 1/8/2024
- Thread starter mikeindabronx
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In 1966 I had a summer job for the US Army Corps of Engineers doing hydrographic surveying at their Barbours Cut shop. Back then it was a quiet backwater with a few boatyards and homes, and a centuries old rumor of hidden treasure from the pirate Jean Lafitte. At the end of the road was a fireboat and a popular burger place at the tugboat station at the very end of the San Jacinto River.
As a dumb college student, I was introduced to functional alcoholics at work (I was in the bossman's group- we were out on the water surveying all day. The other gang reportedly was sitting at a beer joint on Clinton Drive making up numbers on the depth of the Houston Ship Channel), bureaucratic stupidity, and the concept of "good enough for government work".
A bright spot was Rufus G, sliding into his second government job, freshly out of the US Marine Corps and already (in 1966) "back from Vietnam". Even in the boat, 95 degrees and no shade: he was smiling, squared away, wraparound shades, and dangling cigarette; the rest of us sorry bums. By Christmas, his Momma told me later, he had taken his own life.
Now, Barbours Cut is a huge, noisy, 24/365 container port operating along one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. On the computer aerial views, about 1000 feet south of the port, you can still see the skeletal outlines of the US Coast Guard Station; destroyed by Hurricane Carla in 1961.
As a dumb college student, I was introduced to functional alcoholics at work (I was in the bossman's group- we were out on the water surveying all day. The other gang reportedly was sitting at a beer joint on Clinton Drive making up numbers on the depth of the Houston Ship Channel), bureaucratic stupidity, and the concept of "good enough for government work".
A bright spot was Rufus G, sliding into his second government job, freshly out of the US Marine Corps and already (in 1966) "back from Vietnam". Even in the boat, 95 degrees and no shade: he was smiling, squared away, wraparound shades, and dangling cigarette; the rest of us sorry bums. By Christmas, his Momma told me later, he had taken his own life.
Now, Barbours Cut is a huge, noisy, 24/365 container port operating along one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. On the computer aerial views, about 1000 feet south of the port, you can still see the skeletal outlines of the US Coast Guard Station; destroyed by Hurricane Carla in 1961.
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Once again, a fatal Ship Fire. After the loss of two brave firefighters, in Newark's, Port Newark in the auto transporter fire, has anything been done to upgrade the training of firefighters in "shipboard firefighting." I was trained in the U.S. Navy in "Shipboard Damage Control." but fought only a couple of shipboard fires. But I do know, this a hard type of firefighting, is truly, under very difficult conditions. How long will it take until the N.Y, Port Authority takes up the sad message that the deaths the brave Newark firefighters sent the fire service. We can and should not wait to get going in real serious training for all the many fire departments that "WILL" someday have to deal with a "Shipboard Fire." Dones anyone know if any training is planned, anywhere? Captain Bob Rainey FDNY Engine 26 retired
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Two seafarers died and one hurt in containership fire at Port Houston | Port news | Shipping Telegraph
Two seafarers have lost their lives, and another was injured on Monday after a fire aboard a container vessel in the port of Houston, the port
shippingtelegraph.com