Latest / UnDocked: The Maritime Transformation Show / Supply chain strain, training uncertainty & navigation reality

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Supply chain strain, training uncertainty & navigation reality · UnDocked: The Maritime Transformation Show

• Raal: Hello everybody and welcome to Undocked. Hello Nick Chubb. Nick Chubb: Hello, Ryle Harries. week, another hotel room. ⁓ are you now? Raal: Yes, and this time look at the abstract art behind me. I'm the Radisson blue ⁓ Riga, Latvia. Just checked in. So haven't had time to check to see the quality of the soaps. All to come. ⁓ you're... I'll reviewing, maybe I should start reviewing hotels as a side hustle on Undocked. That could be... ⁓ Nick Chubb: wow! ⁓ you've you've upgraded. tuned everyone, that'll be on next week's episode. Yeah, Checked out, you could call it. Raal: Check, ⁓ I'm sensing, I'm sensing a sister show right there, checked out, yeah. I love it, I love it. Well, I am something of an authority, as you say, last couple of weeks. yes, I'll talk about a little bit more about my adventures in a minute, but you're in London, I take it, or thereabouts. ⁓ Nick Chubb: You Yeah, I'm just at the office. And ⁓ I haven't traveled for a while, actually. But I am traveling next week. So ⁓ see in hotel next week. I'll let you about the soap. Raal: So what's been going on? I've had my head down and various fronts. So what's been going on? Nick Chubb: Yeah, well, think it's worth pausing ⁓ taking note that I think it's exactly today actually is 60 since the US Israel attack ⁓ Iran and closure of Strait of Hormuz. And I think when we first talking it, This episode of Undocked is brought to you by Lloyd's Maritime Academy. Not all training is created equal. In maritime, learning needs to reflect real world challenges. Lloyd's Maritime Academy delivers courses designed by industry experts built around practical applications, not just theory. From compliance and operations to digital transformation and emerging technologies, their programs are aligned with where shipping is heading. It's not just about gaining knowledge, it's about applying it. there was a belief, from my side, I think from both of us, that could be over fairly quickly. And we're two in, and it's looking increasingly And I think that's gonna creating some interesting knock-ons in the supply chain that are worth talking about, which I'll do it a bit a quiz for you. Do you know... To explore courses that keep you relevant, search for Lloyd's Maritime Academy. What? loaf of bread, iPhone, an car, a tube toothpaste and a tin of paint. All have in common. ⁓ Raal: Well, at this point, I'm thinking I might even fail the Mocha test, because I can't even remember what that list was. Can I hear that again? Person, giraffe, what was it? No, go on. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. What do they all have in common? Oh. Nick Chubb: loaf of bread, iPhone, car, tube toothpaste ⁓ and tin of paint. ⁓ Raal: I've no idea. I can't think of anything offhand that connects them all together Nick Chubb: they all have ⁓ their supply chain. Raal: Really? Nick Chubb: Yeah, and where does 53 % of global seaborne sulfur trade come from? Raal: Is it from, by any chance, the Middle East region? Yeah. Nick Chubb: It is indeed. Yeah, it's so it's not just oil. We've kind of got to the point. There's two interesting things happening. One is just in the last 48 hours or so, it's been reported that tankers ⁓ at ⁓ record level of ballast operations, which means that they're empty. ⁓ they're basically ⁓ it went from being ⁓ being massive demand for tankers and all of the tanker operators. Raal: Yes, I saw that. Nick Chubb: crude oil operators making a lot of money chartering their ships. at a point where, you know, what tends to happen with these supply chain crises is the effects don't get felt ⁓ usually a few months out. you know, you loaded oil in the Middle East in the of March, it wouldn't be about now, ⁓ end of April, that oil is starting to arrive in places like the Far East, South America, Europe. You you're sort talking to eight weeks. so we've just got to the point ⁓ we're now starting to see genuine shortages the supply of oil, which means there's now a glut ⁓ of oil that are available for work that there is no work for. ⁓ So it's that of first early indicator that the supply of is starting to dry up the world, but other commodities. And sulphur is biggest one. Sulfur and sulfur which obviously goes create sulfuric acid is used in a whole of different industrial practices. So, ⁓ the production of ⁓ production of copper, copper wiring, which all ⁓ up in, there's kilos of copper wiring in an electric car, all of white goods, solar panels, heat phones, laptops, the production nickel, you sulfur, so that's lithium batteries, creating stainless steel, even coins. Sulfur goes ⁓ Raal: Mmm. Nick Chubb: lots of personal care products or is it used in the production for lots of care personal care products so things like shampoos, toothpaste, detergents, c, aspirin, paracetamol and there are some more direct uses like sulfuric acid straight into ⁓ car batteries for ⁓ the paper packaging Raal: Yeah. Nick Chubb: world to use an ingredient in paint, dye, glass. like enough, all of industrial processes for the things that we don't really think about but use every single day are going to start to get snarled up if this carries on for another few months. ⁓ Raal: Yeah, yeah. And it's quite mad stuff, Sulphur. I don't want to digress, but just kind of ⁓ maybe the seed, because it's not something we see typically. But I remember being in Vancouver Port and taking a seaplane ⁓ and these mountains of bright yellow stuff. And I was like, what the hell is that? And my at time was like, ⁓ that's Sulphur. But anyway, to your funnily enough, Nick Chubb: can digress. ⁓ really? Yeah, it's a powder, it? Raal: Shout out to another podcast. I was listening to Mark Williams on the rocks podcast on the plane today. He was focusing on bulk and effects on the bulk trade of the up in the, that sounds very doesn't it? The snarl up in the straight of Hormuz, the complete closure of the straight of Hormuz. Making very similar points, the fertilizer one, he gave an example on there. I hope I'm not misquoting you Mark. Where he was talking about a farmer that I think he connected to personally. Nick Chubb: Right. Okay. Raal: But he was saying like that it was now better off selling his fertilizer than using the fertilizer to generate, you know, to grow the crops and sell the crops. Yeah. That's the order of magnitude now that we're looking at in terms of these sort of availabilities. And it is really, really scary because talked about it before on the show about like the sort of the supply chain, the fragility of it. And the fact that it works at all is almost ⁓ you know. ⁓ it doesn't take much before. Nick Chubb: Really? Wow. Yeah. Raal: things start to, you know, to take effect and your time scale is kind of interesting as well that you're saying there's 60 days and starting to see that because I saw that about the tankers and it's again, it's that sort of counterintuitive thing that ⁓ go and I read it and I thought, hang on a minute, you know, that can't be right. But yeah, it's really, I mean, to point around, I think position always it would either be over really quickly or would Nick Chubb: Yeah. Raal: take, you know, it would become deeply entrenched and so it wasn't over quickly. Nick Chubb: And the problem with industrial supply chains is it's not like a computer. You can't just switch it off and back on again. So, a byproduct of the production of natural ⁓ and comes from essentially when you take sulfur out of oil and gas it would a waste product but it has lots important uses. Shutting down the of oil gas ⁓ is something that you once ⁓ the processing plants are off take many weeks if not months to bring back online. So even if the straight-forward moves is open tomorrow, ⁓ is looking highly we'll be a position where there will be some weeks, if not months before supply chains get back to normal. there will be further if not months before we actually start to see the impact of the supply chain coming back to normal. I fear, we are at beginning of what will be quite a disrupted ⁓ summer. with everything from aviation fuel to manufacturing of car tires being disrupted. One other interesting which I always find slightly ironic when it it happens usually every few years, is CO2. We're always struggling, struggling to take it out of the atmosphere. We're always struggling to get CO2 produced a that is of a high enough that it can be used in food production. all of if you have pack of crisps, example, the way ⁓ that the crisps don't go in the is that the in the packet CO2. Same way that if buying, you know, chicken, the supermarket or anything like that. And the UK government Raal: Yeah. Nick Chubb: last week £100 million. to reopen CO2 plant in Teesside as contingency. was moth-bored in September. ⁓ And these things take a long time to bring back online and need support to do it. But the government is as part of the kind of contingency planning for a potential CO2 in the UK, which would disrupt the UK food security. They've now started funding kind of reopening of those production plants. we're starting to see, you I talked a few ago about the different between complicated systems and complex systems. The supply chain is a complex system and we're now starting to see some of those second and third order effects come ⁓ light. The silver lining, you can call it that, I think that you might see is that this have a genuine impact on the markets and it will have a genuine impact on cost of living which create political pressure ⁓ to end ⁓ the or end Raal: Mmm. Nick Chubb: And that is, I think, possibly the only silver lining in what is otherwise quite a bleak picture. Raal: Yeah, yeah. And of course, I think, you know, we've made a conscious decision not to keep giving, giving rolling commentary on this and, you know, the attacks to vessels and all of those sorts of things, which have continued. So, but just, you know, just to say that doesn't mean that we're not thinking about the people that are out there in the region and what they're going through. it's, it's, hearts go out to everybody. It's a, it's really tough. We did talk about it last week as well. It's also, you know, taking a toll on those that are supporting them and trying to make the system work and trying to kind of you know deal with Getting them out of there or getting people in that do want to go work for crew changes and like that. So yeah. Yeah bad bad times bad times Nick Chubb: Yeah. I did spot quite an interesting angle, a misuse of tech by ships. Every ship an AIS broadcaster, is good. an automatic system, but it basically broadcasts the ship's position. And you can't really fiddle with many of the details on an AIS, but you can the destination. if you were sailing to ⁓ UK, you might put the destination, might put Tilbury, for example. I an article in ⁓ Digital last week actually was looking at the number ⁓ transits being by where they're updating the to instead of being things like which is, know, Fujairah. Raal: Hmm. Nick Chubb: or one of the major ports, the is being changed to things like China owner or Chinese or all crew or even food for And they're being allowed through the blockade by the Revolutionary Guard. there's this sort of weird ⁓ that we're ending up with where ⁓ is primarily supposed to be a safety technology is used as a broadcasting technology to help ships get through Raal: Yeah. to the ingenuity and creativity of mariners. There's so many examples of that, people who kind of can think really creatively on their feet. ⁓ Nick Chubb: Very true. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The ultimate, I mean, this is a compliment, the ultimate cowboys. Because they just get stuff done. Raal: Well, yeah, I mean, I presume that doesn't change the coordinates and the heading or anything like that, because it's just a label, right? Just so people are aware. They're not risking anything by doing this. It's just the label of their destination. Nick Chubb: No, no, no. It's such a broadcast. Yeah. Correct, it's strictly speaking not the right way to use it, but it is becoming common practice the straight. Raal: No. Yeah, yeah, yes, you go, seafarers. They're different breed, as they say. Nick Chubb: Talking of human ingenuity, you're in Riga on a sort of skills conference, aren't you? Raal: Yes, I am. Yeah, I'm here for the Nova Contas People Conference and Nova Contas, you're not aware, Latvia based maritime training center and education provider headquartered here in Riga training facilities like simulators and pools and all those kind of things people use to you will have done all that stuff Nick at one point. So ⁓ Nick Chubb: back in the day. Raal: So yeah, they're very much kind of, and the way it works as well, obviously seafarers are on the move, so they're not just training seafarers here, but all across Eastern Europe, the Baltics, and people will fly in from wherever for specialized courses and stuff like that. And they have a very good reputation, and they've started, I think this is the first year, they've done the People Conference, and really looking at all those kind of themes that I try and shoehorn into every discussion. Pretty much. the where people are in in ⁓ how to get the best out of people build capability and that sort of stuff. So is that the conference here? There's a lot of lots either either sort of education or HR kind crewing, wellness, resilience kind themes lots of academics and and that sort of stuff as well as as well as people here from from crewing world. Just arrived at the hotel a minute ago bumped into a few old faces. So there's some of the some of the people you'll know from on the on the circuit. Nick Chubb: Thanks Raal: But the presentation that I'm doing, I'm really, really pleased with because given me a chance to take a lot of the discussions that we've had ⁓ this show and of stuff that I've done with Pitch Frame and ⁓ some of articles I've written there and sort of build it into that kind of takes people on a and sort of, know, ⁓ half an hour presentation kind of connects. a lot of things that are thematically connected, but not necessarily, you know, not necessarily kind of built into a narrative. So. Nick Chubb: Can you give us a preview? Raal: Yeah, well, by the time this goes out, I'll have delivered the presentation. So it's not, you know, no shame in that. So start looking at the sort of historical perspectives and looking at what would reasonably change in a lifetime. So I use, you know, I use rather hackneyed point of Cleopatra's distance from the pyramids to the iPhone, you know, ⁓ which is a way to start and then compare that to. Nick Chubb: Okay, it's not breaking. Right, yeah, yeah. Raal: the lifetime of my great grandmother who died in 1984. She was born in 1896, you know, the atom bomb, the radio, know, television, computers, flight, you know, I've got those in the wrong order. you get, you know, a life crowded with major sort of developments that change things quite substantially. And compare to my daughter who's 14 years old, born in 2011 relatively, obviously, as you might expect, relatively few things, but things that have happened, such as cloud computing, such as the whole model, which has driven ⁓ work from kind of models, that always on sort of style, which is quite a big change. Almost certainly, we'll see agentic AI in a lifetime. Almost certainly, by a lot of estimations at least, a reasonable. Nick Chubb: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Raal: that superintelligence may arrive in that time. And so by looking at those big and increasingly compressed periods, sort of the that I was hoping to make is that the whole education model that we've built that around is around being able to predict in some way what that future world looks like. And my daughter's choosing her subjects, GCSE subjects right now for a world which we have no idea. Nick Chubb: Yeah. If you... Raal: which is something we talked about on the Peter Rossi that of education of sort of seeing what, ⁓ you looking at what the job is going to require, those kinds of competencies, that's been the education model, it's been the workplace training model, and it implies that some stability down the road that you can kind of plan for. Nick Chubb: If you want to step into a time machine, the way, wife and I have been watching, there's much great television at the moment. So we've all the way back to watching the very original of Louisa Roux's Weird Weekends. I don't know whether seen them, ⁓ but they are fascinating. genuinely fascinating documentaries, they were all shot in the late ⁓ 90s, early noughties. ⁓ And just world was so ⁓ Raal: No, I haven't. Right. Yes. Yes. Nick Chubb: There's a scene of Louis Theroux a payphone to ⁓ the desk of a newspaper to put ad in to the paper. And he just think like... The idea that there'd be a newspaper being distributed physically to of thousands of people that you could put an ad in and you'd have to use a payphone to make that phone call. ⁓ just like it's so far apart and it's only 25 years but it's so far apart from the world we live in today. ⁓ much has changed ⁓ and that's hard, you know, it's not even half a lifetime. ⁓ Raal: Yes. Yes. No, exactly. And I think as well, it's like, I mean, I'm not sure how much time I'll sort of meander into this, but like the, it's also thinking about like the, the equipment something, but the paradigm staying the same, ⁓ you like in my grandmother's lifetime, you know, people, the nature of probably less physical, more machines, you know, in that, throughout that case, but people still went to work, you know, the model for how you prepared people for work. Nick Chubb: Yeah. Raal: and the pace at which that shifted sort of generation to generation was manageable. And I think the point that I'm making in the presentation is that that's no longer manageable because we have to already have an idea of built in, you know, need for change on the fly or at least ⁓ model to be, you know, to ⁓ looked at because particularly when it comes to maritime education and training, there is this, we talked about it a few times, this sort of front loaded. idea that you get your license to work. We talked about in the context of cadets last week, didn't we? And sort of, you know, there's an implication that you get role specific courses as you go along and sort of maybe things that as you transition from one vessel type to another, like your Royal Tanker endorsement or something like that. But broadly speaking, there isn't that sort of continuous skills development. And we talk a lot about it, but very, you know, in very few places does it does it really sort of manifest? And then you look at like sort of that model that's been established and where it's kind of coming under strain. And I think, you know, there's so different examples of that. And I think the first one is start with regulation because everything from training perspective, at least, is built out of legislation which was now written in the 70s, you know, I mean, what was it, 78, SDCW. So God knows, I mean, you know, when it was being put together in ⁓ plenary or whatever, you're looking at before that. of course, yes, it was amended in 2010. Wow. You know, a mere 16 years ago, they're doing it, by the way, you know, now we're obviously in the process of looking at STCW revisions for which by my, you know, I'm pessimistic about it, but if you're being optimistic, maybe the mid 2030s is maybe sometime when that will get fully, you know, ratified. Well, it's being designed now. The world in 2035 will probably be Nick Chubb: It's only 16 years ago. Raal: You know, is it going to possibly take into account some of those sorts of things? So regulatory uncertainty is one big strain. Then you've got obviously new fuels, new propulsion, new technologies coming down the and a lot of, you know, some of the regulatory uncertainty is ⁓ certainly do with that. some of what I'm going to present tomorrow, people will probably kind of poo poo and say no, but like, if you look at, as you and I do on a weekly basis, what the speed with which it's moving, the, the extent to which people are backing it ⁓ and looking to it to provide solutions. It's. think some of what I'm presenting is actually really, really feasible and well Nick Chubb: Like what? are the things that you think will take issue with? Raal: Well, think if I was to jump, jump forward a bit, but like I go on to talk about like, if we're going to talk about changing potentially or what needs to happen from a competency model, then I think you do need to think ahead and say, well, what does the future Seafarer look like? And I've channeled for what I'm doing, the very nice illustration that you did for Splash 24 seven, where you said the ship concept. Was it 2013? Nick Chubb: Yeah, yeah, this was the chat. Yeah, 2035, I can't remember. Yeah. Raal: 2035, something like that. Nick Chubb: I'm getting this thing on. Let me see if I can bring it up. Raal: We can cut this bit out, Nick. You know, enjoy yourself. Take your time. Nick Chubb: Yeah. Yes, this was, oh wow, look at that, I 1400 views. This was an imagined conversation between a ship's captain and their agentic helper, with the captain sort of coming up to the bridge in the morning and getting a status report overnight. And effectively, Raal: Mmm. Nick Chubb: what has happened in this Imagine Future scenario in 2035 is that most of the quote unquote grunt work done by the bridge or navigation team is being handled by this agentic assistant and the assistant is effectively just coming back to the captain for guidance. Apart from things like just-in-time shipping all of the kind of paperwork that exactly. Apart all of that, which, so you still the captain sort of having to manually sign and stamp forms and all of that sort of stuff to keep the ship ⁓ in compliance with regulation that is a bit ineffective. But we can link to it show notes if you've got ⁓ the time. It's worth a read. Raal: legal stuff. Yeah. Yeah. It was a credit where it's due. It was a great piece of work and I thought it was really good because it used a storytelling approach and a conversational bit of drama that just brought home to you the kinds of things that would be happening. And I think that's a very good model of what it does. And of course, it asks lots of questions and I'm going to ask those questions around how do you deal with those kind of technologies? in a high reliability environment where we're looking for stability, we're looking for predictability, we're looking for a classified piece of equipment, type approved, it does all the, very much nailed down. This is a system that the whole point of it is that it learns, it reasons, it works stuff out, it evolves. That's gonna be very, very difficult to kind of get as a type approved system. But the idea that you're looking at there and the parallels are clear. you know, as well, nice sort of parallel with the 2001 Space Odyssey HAL supercomputer, you know. this stuff is obfuscated behind the panel, as it were, because talking to this. And again, that speaks to what we've said, where we've about what's the future of the interface when everything is kind of happening in a much more question and answer conversational type way. Nick Chubb: Yeah, yeah. Raal: So I think as fanciful and crazy as this sort of picture I'm painting sounds, I think there's enough indicators that this is nearer than we think. Nick Chubb: doesn't actually sound that fanciful to me. Internally, ⁓ haven't live with any it in production, but we've been LLMs. So we run... We do something like 250 primary research interviews a year they all go into a centralized database. It all gets anonymized. And you know, you want to understand ⁓ the changing needs cyber management professionals the bulk segment, we've probably got four or interviews over the last year ⁓ of people in that market. But even with the data well structured, all that sort of stuff, it's hard to pick out insight. It takes time to trawl through it. You know, don't have to go and redo the interviews every time, ⁓ it's not a straightforward exercise to kind of do thematic across ⁓ lots interviews. But what have been able to do is plug in large language model and agentic tools to that same set that body of and ⁓ out research ideas, angles, that we ⁓ the kind of human operators of this system that know it inside out, had even considered, had no about, would never have thought to imagine. And I can totally if you take the same concept and apply it to, know, learning content, you would pretty, I imagine, pretty results ⁓ for a fairly small investment. Raal: Well, yes, I mean, that's the thing, there's some bits where I go into this. And there's an article on ⁓ website which talks about this. The issue is we've already had the most effective learning experiences anybody ever had like thousands of years ago. It one person talking to another person and giving them and totally responding one to one. The issue that had to face is to try and scale without losing that kind of quality. And of course, the less Nick Chubb: Yeah. Raal: the less personalized it becomes, the less checks and everything can happen. And AI just solves that problem for you potentially. And so it allows you to flip that the only thing that was really holding back a deeper, more contextual, let's talk about what we're really talking about here. When we come at it from a learning perspective, scenario learning, very, very effective. What's the problem? You know, you could never make one for every single context of the scenario that would need to be adjusted to make it relevant to the person that's doing the job. No, you can. You could do it. you know, the first thing that you could do that with was a script. Now you can do it with a video, you know, or a talk track or whatever, you know, like it's happening so, so quickly that the barriers to doing the personalized kind of approach. Now, what's the biggest barrier? of them all to the kind of model that I'm talking about. Nick Chubb: the attention of the individual receiving it would be my guess. The cost of producing this stuff is going to zero or near enough, but every human who has to receive it has the same, or varies from person to person, but has limited bandwidth to actually take the information in and learn from it. Raal: mmmm Yeah. Yes, but I would argue that's an existing problem that it will be made better by personalization and relevant, you making it tailored and relevant What can you think of another one another? been through the system yourself They educate maritime education training system I'll, I'll, shall I put him out of his misery, ladies and gentlemen? It's a Yeah, regulation that the whole, the whole thing is predicated on everybody doing the same thing. Compliance training is not just maritime actually, but the whole concept of compliance training. They don't really care what you learn. They just want to be able to prove that everybody went through everything from start finish and then got the certificate at the end of it. Nick Chubb: Yeah You're going to leave massive pause in the edit. Right. Yeah. Raal: But more broadly than that, the maritime education and training system is largely built on the whole point that they want to have control over how something was consumed, what was the curriculum, all of those sorts of things. And so this is going to be a massive constraint. You're going to have paradigm which is driving adaptability, learning on the fly, human capability support in real time, let's say, learning in the flow of work. And then you're going to have a technology barriers for that and the cost barriers of that falling away. But I don't see a big appetite to the paradigm of how we certificate training. Now, I'm not saying for a second it can be Wild West. This is a high compliance, high reliability environment. But A, there's a mixture when you look at ⁓ the that you want to do to support human capability, there's a mixture between things that are, let's call it in the compliance bucket where you do need that assurance. Nick Chubb: you Raal: And then there are things that are quite often called value add training where that's more about, you know, developing skills and that sort of stuff. And that, that stuff, mostly people accept could be done from a more of an adaptive perspective. But I think even if we come back to that sort of compliance high, high stakes stuff, I think what we've got to try and get to is a mindset where we say if the corpus that we're working to is standardized and approved, the pathway doesn't need to, to be, but that. will be an enormous challenge. If you think about the fights I've had in my lifetime to try and convince people that the learning outcomes are preserved through, even if you might go a digital route when they're used to doing it in a classroom, those were big, big fights. People have real concerns about it and legitimate concerns in a lot of cases. Sometimes it's just awareness, but there's also, there are some good arguments behind it. But these are the conversations that I'm hoping to provoke. tomorrow and I'm to continue to probe at because I think that we need to get ready for some shift the because otherwise I think it's going to break. I think that need to get ready for some shift in the model because otherwise I think it's going to Nick Chubb: This is a perfect to topic I wanted to talk about, which is research ⁓ launched by North Standard came out They've done something called ECDIS training assessment. ⁓ Did you see this? Raal: No, I didn't. always on the lookout for training topics. I miss this one. Nick Chubb: I thought you would be, I thought this would be right up in your... So since 2004, North Standard have undertaken 5,000 bridge team assessments on the use of ECTIS. So basically assessing the competence of bridge teams on the use of ECTIS. And they've just published the results and it makes for some quite interesting reading. So I'm going to give you a topic. Raal: Hmm, in the use of it, Nick Chubb: and want you to tell me what think would be the percentage respondents who are all trained deck officers, so down to third mate, the percentage of respondents ⁓ get the questions right that topic area. So on ⁓ understanding ⁓ how to install ⁓ electronic navigation and conduct chart updates, ⁓ how many do you think would that as percentage? Raal: ⁓ that's gonna be low. Because there's not that many, I don't think that many of them it that often. ⁓ Nick Chubb: you're close. It's 54 % of seed fairies. Perhaps more importantly 45.3 % got the assessment wrong on doing chart updates. Raal: I nearly said 54 as Okay. Nick Chubb: What about? What about ECTIS displays and alarms? So assessing the bridge team's knowledge of ECTIS color palettes, presentation of information on the ECTIS, and the ECTIS alarms. Raal: Yeah, I reckon this would be bad as well. But I went a little bit too low last time, didn't I? I think it's going to be in a very similar region, that one. I'm going to go 56%. Nick Chubb: So that's 69%. So you're roughly right, but well, you're doing the industry. doing the industry a bit at ⁓ service there. ⁓ ⁓ shy of 70 % of. Raal: in the right sort of... I've done a lot. Yeah. Nick Chubb: submissions got that correct. about a third of teams ⁓ have a gap on ⁓ ECDIS checking and verifying that the completed passage plan is correct. Raal: I'm more optimistic about that one. I'm going to go 70. Nick Chubb: bang on. 70 % of bridge teams got that correct but that means 30 % are getting it incorrect. and I'll do one more. recognizing symbols on the display, so identifying what voyage is or all the kind of markings on the electronic charts. Raal: that's... trying to remember the reason I know these is because I did I've made a few actis courses and we did stuff on This is a tricky one. I'm trying to remember if there's any, I'm presuming there's nothing type specific, so they must surely still mirror the old cards that everybody did at Naval College, which they probably, I'm gonna go 85. Nick Chubb: 85 85 getting it correct the answers Raal: No, that's crazy. Yeah, no, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go 75. Nick Chubb: like that you brought it down there. The answer is 67%. So a third of Raal: ⁓ but there are some outlying ones which don't show up very often and they might have got caught out on some... Nick Chubb: us. third of bridge teams failed to recognise navigational hazards on the chart. Raal: was the hazards. ⁓ that's not quite so good. Nick Chubb: thing is, ⁓ kind of, looked at this, you're possibly more pessimistic than I am about the state of competence across the industry. I looked this and felt pretty I would have expected a competent bridge team, to closer to like 80, 90 % correct. Raal: I would have hoped those would a bit higher. Well, read that as me being pessimistic about it. I think I'm a little bit more pessimistic the way in which we measure some of things and some of the, yeah, I mean, of course some things that are like recognizing hazards and stuff like that, it is a concern. There is a concern, but I think... I think you also need to look at it through another lens as well and say, you know, how many of us that drive around safely every day could pass our driving test if we had to go and do it again. driven for 20 years or something. Do know what I mean? It's sort of like there are some glaring things in there. You've also got to take into account the in which the assessment was done, the quality of the assessment itself. So it's an indicator and it is a concerning indicator, but I don't necessarily read that as incompetence. There's probably quite a lot of things to look into there. But it does bring us back to what I was saying really around that need for us to have a much better picture around connect. We're using, using assessment data at the moment as a proxy for real world. No one cares if anyone passes a test. The test itself doesn't matter. But we're using that to try and understand what someone's capability is in the real world to be able to do things. the more we kind of start to pull in that data and really understand what's going on, I think the better we're going to have, the better these conversations are going to be. Do know what I mean? I'm not making excuses for people not knowing things that they, you you could easily argue that they fundamentally should, but I think it's a complex picture, a more complex picture than perhaps a... an assessment like that is going to show up. of interest, are they, was North Standards on it, what are they going to do? Are they looking to then reinforce? Nick Chubb: they outlined one, two, three, four, five, six urgent knowledge gaps that the industry needs to cover. So that's ENC installation and updating. I mean, we spent in college, we spent hours and hours and hours, days, weeks, learning how to draw chart corrections onto the chart. And I don't think that's translated into electronic charts in the same way at all. Raal: Yeah, I mean, think there's all sorts of things about electronic charts that, you know, the way in which, it was such an effort, wasn't it, to get it done. But there are, there are sort of massive changes, I think, just in terms of the way that they're used and what's implied, you know, because it's almost like a, I don't want say it's like a sat nav, but you know what I mean? It's like, I probably 15 years ago being in a Nick Chubb: It's. Raal: working on an ECTIS course and in the that we were doing with various experts and things like that, and people talking about the possibility of ECTIS assisted groundings, and they've happened, haven't they? Where people have been looking at the screen. It's meant to be a chart. You wouldn't look at a paper chart, would you? But because this thing is updating in real time, it ⁓ your attention into being some sort of navigational aid of that kind, when it's not. There's also that thing about, like those ones where they have the big digital tables for the electronic charts, because that's more like a paper chart. It gives you that, that sort of scale and sense of like how you should be using it rather than the ones that are sort of up on a panel mounted scale. And they've always bothered me those, know, and they're sort of claustrophobic and you've got, because you can layer on information, all of the manufacturers make it possible to do this. And that, again, you know, like if you said to me, let's break that, those assessments down. I would imagine that the really critical things that would have been on the S mode if they'd ever managed to do it, you know, that white label mode that all ectuses were supposed to kind of work towards, you know, those sorts of things I back most people to get. It's all this other stuff that clouds the picture, but material as well because, you know, if you get safety contours wrong and things like that, you know, these are like big things that will completely change it. That would never happen on a paper chart, It would never ever, because you couldn't do it. So the of the digital aspect of it brings benefits, but it also brings additional complications, which brings me back rather elegantly to my presentation, of course, that I'm giving. But that's the thing about thinking through the human aspects of technology and what happens when you, unintended consequences of it. Nick Chubb: What do you? Well, you'll be pleased to know that over two thirds of bridge teams assessed showed knowledge gaps regarding in the availability chart of depth contours and how that affects the safety contour. And of those assessed were unaware of what the deep contour is and how affects the E &C display. So I think there to me at least, ⁓ this highlights like ⁓ genuine and quite knowledge ⁓ that exists, I imagine, the whole industry. Raal: Yeah. this would be my other point, is that when we look at the data points available, imagine that needs analysis engine that I was talking if we were to build this sort of robust digital system. The ability to be able to throw in these kinds of industry reports would be just as important. You've got regulation on one side, that's kind of how people imagine things are going on. The ability for companies to learn from what's happening out in the industry and seeing things in there, know, incidents, CHIRP data, MAIB reports, Coast Guard stuff, you know, all of these things potentially be really, really helpful in identifying. And I guarantee you there'll be training managers and people working in ship companies and ship owners. who will listen to his podcast will have made a note based on what you've just said there, if they haven't already seen the North Standard Report, you know, to go do that. And ⁓ exactly what we should be doing. If you see an industry trend, you know, that's exactly when to sort of just go and sort of go, well, I'm not going to leave this to chance. I'm going to sort of see if I can bring that up. And it is shocking because when you look at an industry level and, you know, no, Nick Chubb: We'll put it in the show notes. Raal: pointing fingers at any individual companies. These are things just talking about an industry level. Things come back that you thought were just buried, done, table state stuff. Col-REX is an increasing discussion ⁓ Col-REX. I mean, this is like the fundamental basics, right? But typically, again, it's not that, do you know what? No one... Nick Chubb: Yeah. Raal: was able to recite rule 10, you know, not the problem. People probably can do that, but it's being able to interpret that in the right way, in the right situations and see stuff unfolding and make the right calls there. mean, anyone who's been on the of a ship going through the Singapore Straits, for example, you know, that is just like a different game. Imagine the English channel is probably very similar. Have you been through the Singapore Straits, Nick? Have you ever done that? Yeah. Nick Chubb: you I have number of times an English channel for that matter. Raal: Amen. Yeah, but I mean, you know, like, could when you're teaching coal rigs, you normally got like, you know, in the old days, they sort of have a couple of counters, wouldn't they? And they show this ships heading over here and this one's coming here. And you of course, that's been translated to computer. But normally that normally my experience with the learning materials, there's like two, three ship situations, because that's where you're saying, you know, vessel, own vessel doing this and crossing vessel is there, you know, and it looks at getting get in the on the bridge of ⁓ a ship going through the Singapore Straits and tell me where the crossing vessel is and the overtaking vessel is and the, you know, and by the way, don't miss that little ferry and I'm just like mental. And these things evolve over so, time in which incidents evolve over and the point at which it's now already too late, you know, it's hugely complicated, isn't it? Nick Chubb: Yeah, is and I think there is a gap the between lot this stuff and the lived reality. That's I is quite interesting about this EGTA's Training Assessment Report is that they are trying to identify knowledge gaps in existing bridge teams. by having them effectively kind of take this quiz. And I think that, you know, probably most serving deck officers, or one would hope most serving deck officers will be able to recite rule 10. But the interpretation of that rule... in which traffic separation seems to be the interpretation of that rule reality can be something very, very, different. I having a heated, heated argument with a because we were in an area of strong tide about wording in Rule 10, which the wording is ⁓ at heading of 90 degrees. And so were a heading of 90 degrees across the traffic separation scheme, but that meant our course was way where we going. And my opinion was that we to effectively swallow the fact that we were to go off course because we had to maintain our heading. his view on it was slightly different actually we should we should be doing a course of 90 degrees the separation scheme during our to it and people listening write on a postcard what they think correct answer was but I'm fairly certain I right but that like that's a very simple of the difference between the the theoretical production of this stuff and then the practical application of it. there is a requirement on mariners the to be expert. in a whole load of different areas and I think this ECTIS thing is an interesting one because it know it requires you to be an expert in how computer systems work, requires you be an expert in how data is collected and applies, it requires you to be an expert in positioning systems work, you know all of these things. ⁓ Raal: Well, let go a little further if I may, because it plays directly into my hands. Imagine now that you were talking to there in that scenario was an AI who had access to way more information than you absolutely ability recall all of the things we've talked about. But you were still sure. How would that play out? Nick Chubb: if the AI was telling me that I was wrong. mean, ultimately, I'm the one the ticket and I'm the one that's responsible. still comes down to me as the human operator to make that decision, make that call. Raal: Yes, yeah. But would you be more or less likely to doubt the advice given that this thing that you were talking to had access to all the world's information, the letter of rules, etc.? Nick Chubb: I've enough time dealing AI systems and ⁓ a ⁓ to ⁓ my knowledge over, ⁓ still with the world's knowledge. ⁓ Raal: Good. Well, if only you were in the room tomorrow when I give this presentation, I could have zoomed in on you. like the point is that there's a secondary point here and that happens also with the kind of arguments between people on the bridge. And that is, not just your of the rule. You have to factor in the other party's perception of the rule. Nick Chubb: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Raal: And there have been cases where people have said, no, no, I've got the right, I've got the right of way. I've got the right of way. That person's going to give way and they don't. And there's, you know, potential for incidents there. So there's, I think there's a real danger with something like AI system that it works on the idea that every, it allow for the fact that a human being may just not do what you expect them to do. Whereas a human would be looking for different signals and allow for that possibility, you know. the is going on. Nick Chubb: I had a very early on in my career when I was a very green, Billy the Idiot cadet. I on watch the captain and his supervision, I had the con. ⁓ And I asked opinion. are you happy for me to... just uptight of some anchored vessels he said to me, well, ⁓ yourself in the shoes of the anchored vessel. Would be happy for us to pass uptight of you? And I of thought, sat and thought about it for a minute, I thought, no, I wouldn't, if we break while crossing them, then we'll down onto them. so I think, stretching my memory, the theoretical practice of good seamanship says to keep starboard open. ⁓ actually passing down tired of these anchored ships we weren't doing that but was it was more about the kind of empathy and courtesy required to the ship and making sure you don't give the officer the watch on that ship a total blind panic that you're crossing too I think that kind of changed way I thought about the rules from that day onwards. It's actually much more about trying put yourself in a place of ⁓ empathy the other vessel and understand they would be happy with and what they would like to see if they were in their shoes looking at you as a ship. But that doesn't happen very often, I don't think. Raal: All these topics of course, Nick, about the way in which the human interfaces with technology and the unintended consequences and the second, third order events, how you manage it. These we're going to be talking about, I think we can now reveal, we're going to be talking about these in Bergen, right? At the Bergen shipping week. Nick Chubb: in our very first Undocked Live. Raal: Yeah, we're very happy about this. I'm very grateful for them all, team there for expressing an interest and us the opportunity. So I know ⁓ whether really know that much about it. I think that there's a few shipping weeks, isn't there, around the world. But I Bergen One is definitely one to watch. It looks like it's going to be a fantastic program. I don't think it's quite announced yet. we were shown the various sort speakers and sessions and it looks pretty amazing, doesn't it? Nick Chubb: Yeah, they've got some incredible speakers and then us and so I went through the agenda and I was like, wow, pressure's on. Yeah, no, I think and it's a short day as well. It's only like 10 till three of content. And so they're packing a lot in from some really, really impressive speakers. And then... Raal: For light relief. Nick Chubb: We'll try our best to what it all means in the context of human and skills and give some some practical takeaways to take back to organizations. But yeah, I'm really excited about it. ⁓ Raal: Yeah, me too. I think, you know, like the thing that I, you mentioned there, it's one day. And I think that's, you know, looking at that program. One of the things that I said to, when we had the meeting earlier this week, it was like, you know, there's, there's two or three day events that don't get through that sort of amount of color in terms of, but it's a very coherent program and it's got lots of, you know, it's, some nice innovative sort of approaches they're taking there. So, so how do people get involved in that one? Is there, we can put the website perhaps in the show notes if it's, if it's up. Nick Chubb: Yeah, if you search for Bergen International Shipping Conference, we'll put the link in the show notes as well, but it's on the 10th of June, 2026, obviously in Bergen, and tickets are available. It's a few hundred quid. Raal: Yeah, and it looks really good. And when you think about like, you know, Bergen, it makes so much sense to for it to have a good shipping week there. So many interesting companies and experts within Norway as well. And a great, you know, it's a great place to host an event as well. Beautiful there and the mountain behind and the. Yeah, well, yes. Yeah, so hopefully we'll probably won't get dark then. Nick Chubb: That's how big of year it is. It's good to have it through the year. No. Raal: There's nothing to think about. We'll just carry on talking and then suddenly it'll be dawn. We'll just walk straight to the airport. But I'm really looking forward to it. It's great. come Come along. And if not, we'll try and I think got sort of vague plans to try and broadcast some stuff or at least capture some content from it so that we can share with all of you in further flung fields. Nick Chubb: Hahaha Yeah, 100%. Awesome, well, I'll enjoy the conference. hope the talk goes well. And look forward to hearing the debrief on it. ⁓ Raal: Yeah. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. I'll be sure to look out for some other topics from some of the other speakers as well and maybe give a bit of a recap when we see you all next time. Nick Chubb: All right, thanks all. Speak soon. Raal: Thank you. Bye.