LITTLE CURRENT—On Saturday, July 27 at the Anchor Inn, the Little Current Yacht Club (LCYC) presented Captain Seann O’Donoughue, speaking on commercial shipping on the Great Lakes, for their ongoing series ‘WD 40 for the Mind.’ If you had the slightest notion the subject matter would be a bore, you’d be wrong. Maybe it was the presenter who made it otherwise, but the talk Captain O’Donoughue gave was nothing less than fascinating.
Perhaps it had to do with the fact that Capt. O’Donoughue, who’s been at sea for the past 40 years, loves what he does and loves to talk about it. “Basically, I thought ships were big and cool when I was a kid and I guess I still think that now,” is how he began. In high school, he sailed on the brigantines. They sail with kids from the ages of 14 to 18, leaving from Toronto area and travelling all through the Great Lakes, always coming through Little Current and the North Channel. Capt. O’Donoughue did this from Grades 10-13, liking it so much he chose a career path that began at Georgian College. “A three-year marine program, and in those three years, you spend 12 months at sea, gaining sea time. So, when you’ve graduated, you’ve got work experience, chances are the ship you went on, freighters, usually, will hire you and you’ll start your career from there.”
Capt. O’Donoughue’s talk was punctuated with photographs in a slide presentation, showing various tankers that travel the Great Lakes, showing the scrapes and patches of ships that have slipped and slid through the locks in various locations. He showed pictures of ships he had captained, always with an anecdote or two. “These ships are big,” he said. “Standard length is 730 feet long; it will carry about 30,000 tonnes or so of cargo. So, you learn how to handle them empty, how to handle them light.” He was referring to the simulators at Georgian College, where he’s been teaching part-time for the past 24 years, through the winter months when the lakes freeze over and the ships are laid up.
Capt. O’Donoughue’s talk became even more fascinating when he moved on from his career as captain to what he does now: piloting with the Great Lakes Pilotage Authority (GLPA), specializing in District 3, which includes Lakes Superior, Huron and Michigan. He’s been a pilot with GLPA for the past nine years and is also the advisor for developing cruise shipping in the upper Great Lakes.
“Any foreign flag freighter coming into the Great Lakes must have a licenced pilot aboard. Domestic fleets, all the captains and deck officers have their pilotage, but a foreign flag ship, this captain can bring the ship around the planet, but by law, he’s got to have a pilot aboard who knows the area, including the slang we use on the radio,” Capt. O’Donoughue explained. He was also very knowledgeable about exported and imported products that moved through the Great Lakes on foreign ships.
As advisor for developing cruise shipping in the upper Great Lakes, Viking Cruise ships came to him and, giving him the beam of their ships (78 ft. wide), said they wanted to bring them through the locks, but they didn’t want the paint scratched. The width of their ships left one foot on either side. But with three bow thrusters, two stern drives, and with 18,000 hp (an average laker has maybe 8,000 hp), they can do a lot to control their ships. Still, a bit of research and a lot of simulation work helped to make the passage through the locks a little less stressful.
The entire presentation was knowledgeable, entertaining and thoroughly enhanced by the photographs that accompanied the talk. Capt. O’Donoughue is an engaging speaker who held his audience for well over an hour, in addition to answering many questions from avid sailors.
The yacht club’s Commodore, Bruce O’Hare, in introducing Capt. O’Donoughue, explained, “We’ve brought back the WD 40 speaker series after 10 years, and I called Seann up, called in a favour, maybe several, and he made the trip up.” Everyone was glad he did and though there are several interesting speakers yet to come this season, Commodore O’Hare stated that this, by far has been the best to date.
by Margery Frisch
