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Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

bbc.com

261–270 of 426 posts

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels slightly more true than the comment you responded to. But I feel that important aspects are left out. I don't feel like I can make much justice for those aspects but here's my two cents: Selling oil on the free market disproportionately benefits those that own the means to process and resell it further. Or rather, those that ultimately coordinate global oil logistics. The global fossil fuel market doesn't…

The means to process and transport oil are commodity, there's very little surplus in it. It just requires a bit of investment, but not much. Exclusive control of 'easy access to Oil' is overwhelmingly the power in that value chain. The 'first order' issue is earlier in the process, it's that 'House of Saud' keeps most of the surplus for their family and furthermore use it to do some suppressive things. The fossil fue…

> The means to process and transport oil are commodity, there's very little surplus in it. It just requires a bit of investment, but not much.

> Exclusive control of 'easy access to Oil' is overwhelmingly the power in that value chain.

Singapore might disagree. But what do they know?

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#262
post #106

His ship has been sitting still for so long that you can see it on Google Maps: https://www.google.com/maps/place/%D8%B3%D9%81%D9%8A%D9%86%D... Edit: a few more story details here: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/19/ever-giv... When he rows to shore to get supplies he can only stay for two hours at most as the area is a restricted military zone. Other crew members were repatriated in September 2019,…

And Google Maps lists it as a "Shopping Mall"

Speaking of the shopping, it actually makes me curious how he has funded buying the food/essentials he needs to survive. I wish that was covered in the story. 4 years is quite a long time, I am not sure how he would be affording it all. Makes me wonder if some kind of charity was helping him out or some local residences maybe. That also makes me wonder if he stayed on the ship all the time or if he also spent some nights with locals.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Downvote me all you want it's not not true. Rich people don't exist without exploiting the poor; so too with countries. I'm not sorry if you're wealthy and this is hurting too close to home, better live with it if you also want to be so wealthy.

The wealthy exploiting the poor predates capitalism by 10s of thousands of years.

> The wealthy exploiting the poor predates capitalism by 10s of thousands of years.

I feel like in order to make this claim, you'd need a pretty detailed definition of what "capitalism" is.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#264
post #241
post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on what company. One headed by people like Ross Perot ( RIP ) definitely will. The other that runs private jail would most likely let people expire if it makes them extra dollar.

It reminds me of the court case that was controversial when Gorsuch was confirmed involving a trucker - "TransAm Trucking v. Dept. of Labour" in particular. It's another case where company property is valued over individuals lives - the case itself hinged on the fact that the employee was free to leave the site on foot but that it was illegal for him to use the tractor half of the truck owned by the employer to reach…

Am I misunderstanding something? The courts ruled in the truckers favor. Besides, I'm not sure a motorcycle would have saved him from the extreme cold.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#265
post #241
post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on what company. One headed by people like Ross Perot ( RIP ) definitely will. The other that runs private jail would most likely let people expire if it makes them extra dollar.

It reminds me of the court case that was controversial when Gorsuch was confirmed involving a trucker - "TransAm Trucking v. Dept. of Labour" in particular. It's another case where company property is valued over individuals lives - the case itself hinged on the fact that the employee was free to leave the site on foot but that it was illegal for him to use the tractor half of the truck owned by the employer to reach…

I must be reading it backwards, but wasn't the order eventually upheld that the employee be reinstated? Gorsuch dissented, but he wasn't the one making the ruling. At least thats what the article I just read on it said, but I could be wrong -- it's early in the morning and I only just had my coffee!

> TransAm appealed, but in a 2-to-1 decision, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed the Board’s reinstatement order (TransAm Trucking v. Department of Labor, 2016). Judge Neil Gorsuch dissented.

https://blogs.illinois.edu/view/25/477996

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#266

Folks - this is what we are outsourcing and externalizing. When foreign entities are able to bid for a lot less, and pay a lot less, a lot of it has to do with the fact that they will not bother with 'end of life' for ships, or getting insurance, or worrying about the lives of people who are 'expendable'. Those very nice buildings in Dubai come from some nasty labour practices. If every piece of this puzzle from end-…

Exactly! And I know hardcore capitalist apologists who would say it was his free choice to agree to be legally bound. If you ask me, that’s some next level mental gymnastics, redefining the term “free choice.” But, there are those who disagree with me, and I expect you’ll see some of them show up to react to my comment.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to me that corporations owning ships having financial difficulties would be a natural consequence of outsourcing behaviour. You want to outsource risk and responsibilities. So the big companies get rid of their ships and hire small companies on the edge of profitability. I assume it's not always the most sound way to do business but some should get away with it.

Name me a country where logistics orgs never run out of money or resources.

The United Federation of Planets doesn’t even use money, and it’s post-scarcity so they don’t run out of resources.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#268
post #250
post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This article says local officials were also holding his passport so that he couldn’t legally leave: https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/chief-mate-strand...

I wonder if embassies can intervene under these conditions, when a foreign government will not release passport.

They can, but will they? It is really tricky to handle this type of thing without declaring war. It's is also tricky for the other country to do this without getting war declared on them.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#269

Folks - this is what we are outsourcing and externalizing. When foreign entities are able to bid for a lot less, and pay a lot less, a lot of it has to do with the fact that they will not bother with 'end of life' for ships, or getting insurance, or worrying about the lives of people who are 'expendable'. Those very nice buildings in Dubai come from some nasty labour practices. If every piece of this puzzle from end-…

Err here in the United States you have people pissing in bottles and bags because they can't take a break without missing targets. The West is not immune to predatory hiring and employment practices.

I have pissed in a bottle before out of expediency, but I've never spent several years stranded on a ship without power, company, etc, out of free will. Conflating the two seems weird.

Re: Stranded sailor allowed to leave abandoned ship after four years

#270
post #179

Folks - this is what we are outsourcing and externalizing. When foreign entities are able to bid for a lot less, and pay a lot less, a lot of it has to do with the fact that they will not bother with 'end of life' for ships, or getting insurance, or worrying about the lives of people who are 'expendable'. Those very nice buildings in Dubai come from some nasty labour practices. If every piece of this puzzle from end-…

The fault here is ultimately with egypt. They were not letting him leave, they took his passport and not even letting him get 'deported' back to his home country. This is not from outsourcing, this is Kafkaesque bureaucracy created by Egypt itself.

Someone is always going to bear responsibility. This is why, when you are incorporating an off-shore company, you need some kind of "representative" in the country itself. These people might be making "free" money but if things turn sour they might find themselves in trouble.

The court did not do some random detention (they did let the rest of the crew) but they declared him the responsible party. In that case, he did break the Egyptian law.

If you are getting a job where you bear a certain responsibility, you have to make sure that the company is not breaking the law through you. You'll be responsible, and worse, if the company is headquartered overseas, you might bear the whole responsibility.

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