Steering a 169ft Boat, M/V Great Point

On October 21st, my class had the opportunity to take a tour on Great Point, one of the Hornblower boats. We met with Captain Kevin, he decided to take all of us into the cabin. He gave some of us roles to do, such as being a lookout on both sides of the boat and assigned someone to be the navigator and another to drive the boat. Daniel, my classmate, took the honor of driving the boat first. Kevin was talking to us and telling us how he got to where he is now. He worked on boats since he was young and worked his way up. He also answered our questions about the industry and gave us lots of important advice about coming into the maritime industry. Such as there's a good chance you can be away from family and missing important events. As we took a tour to see the Statue of Liberty and went down the East River and started heading back. Kevin asked someone else to drive the boat and get ready to rock the boat. At first, I didn’t want to do it because I was too nervous and didn’t want to make things go wrong. This wasn’t common for a high school student to have this experience. Eventually, my class was chanting my name and I gave in. I felt like I had a lot on my plate, you had to make sure you can dock the boat under the watchful eye of Captain Kevin. The Captain was giving me step by step instructions to dock the boat with the barge on the port side of the boat. When I looked at the controls it looked complicated but it made sense after the first couple of minutes see the boat motions changes from the throttle/steering and bow thruster controls. It felt like you’re operating the boat with the controls upside down. If you wanted to move the boat forward, you had to move the handle towards you. If you wanted to move the boat backward, you had to move the handle away from you. There was a handle for the bow thrusters acting like a steering gear for the front of the boat. I was able to use the current to help push the boat gently towards the barge. It was tough to keep the boat from coming too close on the barge but Captain Kevin had calm way of talking me through this. I had to keep moving the boat forward and backward to keep us in one place while the crew member tied the boat to the barge. I was proud when the Captain said I did a great job docking the boat and it looked like I was a pro. I was inspired by what Kevin does daily and how he maintains the stress that comes with being a captain of a 169-foot passenger boat.

~ Jennifer O’Connor