Climbing the Jacob's ladder

 A tale of a dance that can never stall With tired eyes,      He searches through the night His sight becomes lost  Between the sea and the sky Breaking the horizon,               A tiny boat appears        Splashing on the foam,             With no sign of fear                 It quickly darts                  By the starboard side,         Surfing on the waves,             Like a playful child.                    The stars are now watching,         How it jumps up and down,        It looks as it’s dancing  It seems very proud The wind pushes it,                And the sea is not cal...

 Every day hundreds of ships enter and depart the ports of the world making trade possible. Aboard each one of them a pilot, the individual with the local knowledge and experience, is charged with the responsibility to assist  their Captains to ensure that all is done in a safely and expeditious fashion.  Very little is known about these professionals. How is a day on a pilot's life? A day in the (mysterious)  life of a (Panama Canal) marine Pilot. It is 6:00 am and my cellphone rings. I am still half asleep, and while desperately trying to reach for it,  my right hand awkwardly knocks down everything that is on the surface of my night table. Just before the ringing stops I manage to grab the elusive piece of equipment and answer the call. The noise has waken up  my wife, my kids, and probably my adjoining neighbors. "Captain Cabal?" inquires the voice on the other end of the line. "Yes madam, it's me". I am now sitting on the edge of the bed, fully awake. ...

  The Ever Given, Suez, and the (probable)  causes of the accident: a raw reflexion . Shortly after the Suez Canal was blocked by the mega container vessel Ever Given  many experts (and not so experts) started to work theories about the possible causes of the accident. A video showing the track of the ship as it was moving in the channel served as the basis for many to anticipate that speed had been a factor.  -The ship wasn't going at a “safe speed”-, I read many asserting in social media. It is so easy to pass judgment when one is not involved. It is amazing the amount of information a person can gather in order to point a finger. You don't have to be an expert, Google does all the work for you. However, some of the experts, those with a maritime background, took the stand to display their knowledge on ship's hydrodynamic.  Their explanations were rich in technical terms (such as bank suction/ cushion, squat/under keel clearance and so on), and their line of r...

  The Pilot Station, the rotation list, other lists, and our stories. Disclaimer: before you start reading grab a beer or two, a glass of wine, or a glass of Ron Abuelo on the rocks (like the one  Captain Cano, a good man he is, gives me every year for Christmas) or the read might be too long and boring.  Most of us arrive at the pilot station with ample time before our duty starts.  At the beginning I used to do it as the most basic attempt to keep myself away from tardiness. Very often I would show up one hour ahead of time, or more, which eventually made me feel like an idiot. You know, sitting there by my own device whereas I could have stayed home longer. But  soon I became an expert "photo finisher", crossing the door with a smile on my face and the stupid idea that I was getting away with "something", that something being "time". I wasn't. You rarely get away with fooling time. The only thing I was achieving was missing an opportunity. The oppor...