Refuelling Stop
18 January 2010
Written by Captain John Dunne, onboard British Trader
Ships need to refuel from time to time to keep them ready for their voyages. Most of the time on British Trader we mainly use gas for fuel – it’s clean & efficient, and as you might imagine, it’s readily available on a gas ship
However even if operating our boilers in “full gas” mode we still need fuel oil as a back-up in normal operation; we’d also need it as our primary fuel source for the ballast passage if we were instructed to pump out every drop of gas at the discharge port.
When and where you refuel your ship depends on a number of factors. These factors will include such matters as the availability of fuel at the port that you’ll be heading to; the price of fuel at different ports (which can vary greatly); and how much of a reserve you have left on board compared to how much you need to keep as a prudent measure.
Thus the operators, taking all these things into account, ordered the ship to stop at Gibraltar and refuel with 1,000 tonnes of Marine Grade Fuel Oil.
At first we were unable to enter the bay at Gibraltar. Strong gales kept the port closed, and even prohibited us from anchoring on the eastern side of The Rock of Gibraltar, with the Port Control advising us to remain under way.
On the day, there was no let-up in the wind, and night soon fell with the wind howling and blowing without relent.
However, as luck would have it (or not!) we got a call at 2330 from Gibraltar Port Control – “Please come towards the port to take a pilot and go to anchor”. That was the end of a planned nights’ sleep for most people on board!
One of the most interesting things about life at sea is that it rarely follows a routine 9-to-5 timetable. This was especially true for us that night. It can be a blessing but it can also be a nuisance from time to time. But the weather window available to us that night was not necessarily going to last, so we took the opportunity to get into port, and to anchor while the going was good.
At around 4am we dropped anchor. We’d had to wait a bit longer than expected just off the pilot station, while the pilot was busy with a couple of other ships.
It wasn’t long before we had another ship tied up alongside us, ready to pump the fuel to us once we’d gone through our detailed pre-bunkering checklists.
The suppliers were efficient and wasted no time, and by 10am we had all but finished. While at anchor we also topped up on our fresh provisions, and took on board two new joiners. Two outgoing officers were also very happy to sign off and go home from Gibraltar.
We were under way again after lunch and lining up to leave the Mediterranean for our run across the Atlantic.
This was one of the more curtailed visits to port for us. But it was all done very efficiently in the end, and we set sail with fuel topped up, with fresh fruit and vegetables in the stores (along with some eagerly-awaited biscuits) and a nice clear sunny day for us to see our way.