It's been more than six months since I've posted an entry here. The main reason is that I had nothing new to report. It was all "same old, same old" at work and I didn't want to harp on the same crap over and over again.
For five months I worked next door in the "junkyard" under my old/ex- friend Dean, who as I mentioned in my last post had just moved out of his house, with his wife initiating divorce proceedings. We have several echelons of supervisors in the yard. The lowest, a Step 3, is in the union bargaining unit, and thus has union protection/representation, such as it is. In theory (if I can even use such a word in the context of the place where I work) a step 3 is not in charge of a job--that is to say an entire ship. But Dean was a Step 3 for many years, and for the last several had been acting as a Step 2, running many jobs for our department, including those we worked next door at the junkyard, where our company wasn't the prime contractor. Even though the higher-ups tried to persuade Dean to accept promotion to Step 2, he declined for a long time, mostly to keep the union representation and union pension plan. Then, a few months ago, he finally relented. He couldn't have foreseen that this would be a fatal error.
A few weeks ago we learned that Dean had been arrested and jailed, charged with sexually molesting his adolescent step-daughter. Now I have no way of knowing whether there was any truth to the charges. But what made the whole thing suspicious was that, as I mentioned in my last entry--last June--Dean had then just separated from his wife, so presumably since then hadn't been in a position to molest his step-daughter. I suspected that some of this must have been connected with his increasingly messy divorce.
In any event, Dean spent eight days in jail, and when he tried to come back to work they told him he was fired. (They could do this at will since he was no longer a member of the bargaining unit.) Dean had been with the company for over 30 years, having begun as an apprentice. Well, he made a number of phone calls to old friends, as he told me later, "begging" them for his job back. They were able to get him rehired--but only as a "new hire"--a shipfitter with no seniority, and thus subject to layoff whenever the work gets slack. In addition, he went from having four weeks annual vacation to only one as a new hire. Furthermore, the HR director told him that if he spends any more time in jail he'll be out for good.
After this I ran into him in the shop and talked to him for a few minutes. He told me his wife offered to drop the molestation charges if he'd agree to sign the house over to her. I can't be certain that there's nothing to the charges, but even if there is, why did she wait so long to make them if it wasn't simply to use it against him in the divorce proceedings. Property-wise, I'm told, everything belongs to Dean, not his wife, including the house, which he already owned when he married her. (He always provided for the family on his own, he says, as she never worked.) Anyhow, if Dean had stayed in the bargaining unit instead of accepting the Step 2 position they could have busted him back to shipfitter, but not taken away his seniority and vacation.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Hot and Hotter
I'm still working at the yard next door -- the "junkyard." It doesn't get any better, only worse, now with Summer weather upon us. Temperatures often in the 90s. For about a couple of weeks I was working in the engine rooms, where it's very hot even on cooler days, because the ship while in drydock, without the AC functioning, is a big steel oven. The only relief is the ventilation blower we carry around with us. It's about the size of a small beer keg laid on it's side. These are very powerful -- they make a lot of wind, but the blow all the dirt and grit around, too. We lock it up at the end of our shift with a chain and padlock, but sometimes people cut these and take the blowers anyway (which happened to us last weekend).
Other than that, it's pretty much S.O.S., same old shit. I've been bounced around on about six different jobs, without having finished any of them. Well, the other day we (who the "we" is at this moment, I'll get to in a bit) did finish one, four foundations for lube oil pump controller boxes, but today Tim Babbitt, my current supervisor, told Denny Dennison, my partner, we had to take part of it down again, so the cry baby welders could weld part of the back side before we put it up again. I told Denny I wasn't going to do it. "Fuck the welders," was how I expressed it.
Okay, about Denny, who as a matter of fact they sent to another job down river today, so we're no longer working together. He's an odd one, but then everybody in the shipyard is odd, it seems. Denny is 45 years old, was born and raised 5 minutes from the shipyard, and talks like a redneck. He's big -- 6'1" and 260 pounds, with curly dyed black hair and a cherubic face with a smudge of mustache. He's a good fitter when he decides to get off his butt and get moving, which normally takes a while. He plays golf -- usually with his older brother -- and plays the stock market. Because he lives so close, he went home every day for lunch, and when he came back he'd report to me on how the market was doing that day. He told me he's in a garage band (that stays in the garage), plays guitar I think and also sings falsetto! When he first said this I thought he was joking, but apparently not. In addition, he says he's got every song Frank Sinatra ever recorded as well as the Billboard top 100 songs for every year since 1944. It also came out that he likes The Village People. He's not married, evidently never has been, and doesn't seem to have a girlfriend -- or boyfriend.
I've already mentioned Dean, who's in charge of the shipfitters on this job. Many years ago we were friends, but have drifted apart. So I was very surprised a couple of weeks ago when he stopped me to ask about my daughters, the second of whom had just graduated college. He told me he still had a photo of my first daughter when she was two. I don't remember how he turned the subject to himself, but he said his father had died a year or two ago and now he was all alone except for his brother. I said, "But you're married, you have a family." He said his wife wanted a divorce. I asked if it was because he was married to his job, working all the time. No, he said, he had "fucked up." "You mean you were messing around with somebody else?" "No, not really," he said. "That doesn't exactly sound like a categorical denial," I said, but he wouldn't elucidate any further. Thinking about it, and knowing Dean, I'm betting she caught him with pornography on the internet. A few days later I asked him if she was really getting a divorce. "Yes," he said. "Does she have a lawyer?" "Yes," he replied, and added that he was now living in a motel.
Other than that, it's pretty much S.O.S., same old shit. I've been bounced around on about six different jobs, without having finished any of them. Well, the other day we (who the "we" is at this moment, I'll get to in a bit) did finish one, four foundations for lube oil pump controller boxes, but today Tim Babbitt, my current supervisor, told Denny Dennison, my partner, we had to take part of it down again, so the cry baby welders could weld part of the back side before we put it up again. I told Denny I wasn't going to do it. "Fuck the welders," was how I expressed it.
Okay, about Denny, who as a matter of fact they sent to another job down river today, so we're no longer working together. He's an odd one, but then everybody in the shipyard is odd, it seems. Denny is 45 years old, was born and raised 5 minutes from the shipyard, and talks like a redneck. He's big -- 6'1" and 260 pounds, with curly dyed black hair and a cherubic face with a smudge of mustache. He's a good fitter when he decides to get off his butt and get moving, which normally takes a while. He plays golf -- usually with his older brother -- and plays the stock market. Because he lives so close, he went home every day for lunch, and when he came back he'd report to me on how the market was doing that day. He told me he's in a garage band (that stays in the garage), plays guitar I think and also sings falsetto! When he first said this I thought he was joking, but apparently not. In addition, he says he's got every song Frank Sinatra ever recorded as well as the Billboard top 100 songs for every year since 1944. It also came out that he likes The Village People. He's not married, evidently never has been, and doesn't seem to have a girlfriend -- or boyfriend.
I've already mentioned Dean, who's in charge of the shipfitters on this job. Many years ago we were friends, but have drifted apart. So I was very surprised a couple of weeks ago when he stopped me to ask about my daughters, the second of whom had just graduated college. He told me he still had a photo of my first daughter when she was two. I don't remember how he turned the subject to himself, but he said his father had died a year or two ago and now he was all alone except for his brother. I said, "But you're married, you have a family." He said his wife wanted a divorce. I asked if it was because he was married to his job, working all the time. No, he said, he had "fucked up." "You mean you were messing around with somebody else?" "No, not really," he said. "That doesn't exactly sound like a categorical denial," I said, but he wouldn't elucidate any further. Thinking about it, and knowing Dean, I'm betting she caught him with pornography on the internet. A few days later I asked him if she was really getting a divorce. "Yes," he said. "Does she have a lawyer?" "Yes," he replied, and added that he was now living in a motel.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Deja Vu
For three weeks I worked outside the yard, at the Navy Base. When the work there petered out they sent me back to the yard. But they didn't keep me there. They gave me what one of my co-workers called the "double whammy." They brought me back to the yard from the Navy Base bad)and sent me to a job at the yard next door to us (worse).
That yard is supposed to be our competitor and they used to be our competitor. We do submit competing bids, but then the Navy will award one package of ships to them and another package to us. We end up with something like 40 percent of the work on the bids they win, while they get a similar quantity of work on the bids we get. So at any given time there are a shitload of their people working at our yard and visa-versa. They call it a "teaming agreement." Go figure.
Anyhow, everybody hates to work at that yard because compared to ours it's a junk yard. The pits. A shithole. Plus, we have to park at our yard and take a shuttle bus back and forth. That adds about 10 minutes to the commute going home. They have a couple of piers - - actually they're not even piers, they're old barges moored together and anchored in the river. Also a pretty big floating drydock and a bunch of tower cranes. But their main building is a huge old brick structure that looks like a gigantic sweat shop left over from the early days of the industrial revolution. And for the rest it's a hodge-podge of shipping containers, quonset huts, prefabs, and piles of junk that look like the whole thing washed up on shore from some tsunami. But you get used to anything over time. And the atmosphere is pretty slack there, so long as you watch out for their safety inspectors, who're a bunch of assholes.
So, I'm back working for Dean. If you've been taking notes, you might recall that Dean kicked me off the job he was working at this same yard last November because I wouldn't kow-tow to his gofer/lapdog Myron, who had just graduated from the apprenticeship program and been promoted to supervisor, and who threw a tantrum over it. So I was pretty surprised when they sent me back over there to work for Dean. But when I got there Dean acted as if nothing had ever happened. I did overhear part of a phone conversation between him and Myron, however, which I think was about me, with Dean telling the excited Myron that he wouldn't have to deal with me, or something like that.
Anyway, to give what credit is due, although Dean kicked me out before, he apparently didn't rat me out to the higher ups, because I never heard any more about it. So now things are back to the same old same old. They're bouncing me around from job to job. Last week I was installing some foundations to mount new controller boxes in the engine rooms when the ship cut off hot work there because they were draining fuel or something. So they put me on another job for a few days. Monday they told me hot work had been cut back on, but they didn't want me to go back to that job, they wanted me to do something else. Never said anything about rounding up and securing the parts for the engine room job. So later on, when I or someone else goes back to that job the stuff will be missing. And it turns out the job they put me on is the same one that caused me to get kicked off the job on the other ship. I've been thinking of asking Dean what I've got to do to get kicked off this job.
We had another heart attack victim last week. A 62-year-old Filipino rigger on night shift had a heart attack while working last Friday night. They called the rescue squad who tried CPR but they could not revive him. Yesterday somebody posted an obit in the time clock shack. It said he was survived by, among others, his mother and his fiancee.
That yard is supposed to be our competitor and they used to be our competitor. We do submit competing bids, but then the Navy will award one package of ships to them and another package to us. We end up with something like 40 percent of the work on the bids they win, while they get a similar quantity of work on the bids we get. So at any given time there are a shitload of their people working at our yard and visa-versa. They call it a "teaming agreement." Go figure.
Anyhow, everybody hates to work at that yard because compared to ours it's a junk yard. The pits. A shithole. Plus, we have to park at our yard and take a shuttle bus back and forth. That adds about 10 minutes to the commute going home. They have a couple of piers - - actually they're not even piers, they're old barges moored together and anchored in the river. Also a pretty big floating drydock and a bunch of tower cranes. But their main building is a huge old brick structure that looks like a gigantic sweat shop left over from the early days of the industrial revolution. And for the rest it's a hodge-podge of shipping containers, quonset huts, prefabs, and piles of junk that look like the whole thing washed up on shore from some tsunami. But you get used to anything over time. And the atmosphere is pretty slack there, so long as you watch out for their safety inspectors, who're a bunch of assholes.
So, I'm back working for Dean. If you've been taking notes, you might recall that Dean kicked me off the job he was working at this same yard last November because I wouldn't kow-tow to his gofer/lapdog Myron, who had just graduated from the apprenticeship program and been promoted to supervisor, and who threw a tantrum over it. So I was pretty surprised when they sent me back over there to work for Dean. But when I got there Dean acted as if nothing had ever happened. I did overhear part of a phone conversation between him and Myron, however, which I think was about me, with Dean telling the excited Myron that he wouldn't have to deal with me, or something like that.
Anyway, to give what credit is due, although Dean kicked me out before, he apparently didn't rat me out to the higher ups, because I never heard any more about it. So now things are back to the same old same old. They're bouncing me around from job to job. Last week I was installing some foundations to mount new controller boxes in the engine rooms when the ship cut off hot work there because they were draining fuel or something. So they put me on another job for a few days. Monday they told me hot work had been cut back on, but they didn't want me to go back to that job, they wanted me to do something else. Never said anything about rounding up and securing the parts for the engine room job. So later on, when I or someone else goes back to that job the stuff will be missing. And it turns out the job they put me on is the same one that caused me to get kicked off the job on the other ship. I've been thinking of asking Dean what I've got to do to get kicked off this job.
We had another heart attack victim last week. A 62-year-old Filipino rigger on night shift had a heart attack while working last Friday night. They called the rescue squad who tried CPR but they could not revive him. Yesterday somebody posted an obit in the time clock shack. It said he was survived by, among others, his mother and his fiancee.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Snipers . . . and Wannabes
This afternoon we ran out of work so Mack, my supervisor, sent me to another ship on another pier to deliver a required Hotwork Notice form for that ship's Fire Marshall to sign. On the way back to my car a sticker on the back window of a pickup truck that was parked on the pier caught my attention. "Sniper," it said. "No need to run, you'll only die tired." Well the truck was parked next to a DDG, a ship of the same class as the Bainbridge, the ship involved in the rescue two days ago of the merchant marine captain taken hostage by the Somali pirates. That crisis was resolved, as we know, after Navy SEAL snipers killed three of the pirates.
So I wondered if the truck with it's bloodthirsty message might belong to a Navy SEAL sniper assigned to this particular ship. I walked around it looking for clues, and quickly noticed, not any identifying Navy markings, but a parking lot tag and door placard identifying it as belonging to some guy who worked at one of our competitor shipyards. He also had stickers that said "POW-MIA," "NOBAMA, 2008," and "Who's our president - - the answer's a no brainer." This guy wasn't a sniper, he was just some right-wing wannabe. I didn't wait for the owner of the truck to appear, but it wouldn't surprise me if he was some guy in his 50s, overweight, a heavy smoker, with diabetes and a heart condition. Of course, the description would fit a large number of shipyard workers.
That's not to say that I'd put it past a real Navy SEAL sniper to put a sticker like that on his truck. I'm sure there are some who would. I mean, in this voluntary military service there are probably quite a few who get into something like the SEALS and into sniper school because they want a chance to kill somebody legally. Which reminds me of an apprentice we have in our shop, who they say was discharged from the Army for being mentally unstable. I've had a little contact with him, working in his vicinity, and he hasn't done anything crazy. In fact, he seemed quiet and mild mannered. Of course, those are the ones who always turn out to be the killers.
Today I passed an Army recruiting station. Only it didn't say Army Recruiting Station. It said Army Career Center. Yeah. If your want to make a career out of chasing Taliban around the mountains of Afghanistan. I suppose if your career goal is to be sniper and shoot Somali pirates there's a Navy Career Center somewhere. And if you flunk out of both you can always get yourself a macho bumper sticker and stick it on your truck.
So I wondered if the truck with it's bloodthirsty message might belong to a Navy SEAL sniper assigned to this particular ship. I walked around it looking for clues, and quickly noticed, not any identifying Navy markings, but a parking lot tag and door placard identifying it as belonging to some guy who worked at one of our competitor shipyards. He also had stickers that said "POW-MIA," "NOBAMA, 2008," and "Who's our president - - the answer's a no brainer." This guy wasn't a sniper, he was just some right-wing wannabe. I didn't wait for the owner of the truck to appear, but it wouldn't surprise me if he was some guy in his 50s, overweight, a heavy smoker, with diabetes and a heart condition. Of course, the description would fit a large number of shipyard workers.
That's not to say that I'd put it past a real Navy SEAL sniper to put a sticker like that on his truck. I'm sure there are some who would. I mean, in this voluntary military service there are probably quite a few who get into something like the SEALS and into sniper school because they want a chance to kill somebody legally. Which reminds me of an apprentice we have in our shop, who they say was discharged from the Army for being mentally unstable. I've had a little contact with him, working in his vicinity, and he hasn't done anything crazy. In fact, he seemed quiet and mild mannered. Of course, those are the ones who always turn out to be the killers.
Today I passed an Army recruiting station. Only it didn't say Army Recruiting Station. It said Army Career Center. Yeah. If your want to make a career out of chasing Taliban around the mountains of Afghanistan. I suppose if your career goal is to be sniper and shoot Somali pirates there's a Navy Career Center somewhere. And if you flunk out of both you can always get yourself a macho bumper sticker and stick it on your truck.
Monday, April 13, 2009
It Must Be Finished When I Say It Must Be Finished!
At the start of the shift on Monday, March 30, Ronnie Wilson picked me out of the shape up meeting and told me I was going to another job - - a job outside the yard at a nearby Naval base.
That morning, before work, as some of us were sitting around the lunch table in the fabrication shop, Kenny the burner said they were sending him to that same ship, and I said, because Kenny always kids around about not wanting to work with me, "Well, I'm going down there with you." I meant it as a joke, but Kenny didn't know that. So you can imagine my surprise when Ronnie gave me the news.
Well, not real surprise, because I seem to have an uncanny knack for making a joke about something and then having it come true. I wasn't sorry to be sent on a job outside the yard. For one thing, the Naval base is closer to where I live so it means less commute time. And the atmosphere is always freer outside the yard - - not so many big shots and would-be big shots walking around. Not so many rules.
The thing that kills me, though, is that they sent me off without even asking for any turnover on my job - - that is to say, without my briefing my replacement on where things stood. The diagonal aluminum bulkhead. The job wasn't finished, and who knows who they might have given it to. I took it upon myself to pass on to Vince where I'd hidden two parts they'll need (so they wouldn't grow legs and walk away), but there's no telling if he'll remember, or even if he does, whether he'll tell whoever takes over the job. More wasted time while whoever it is figures things out.
Anyhow, now I'm down at the Naval base on a 'hot' job. Kenny and I are installing two new watertight doors. The supervisor there is Mack, an old fitter who they made a supervisor a couple of years ago. Last year he had a heart attack and had to have multiple by-pass surgery. He's supposed to take it easy, so he usually spends his time hanging out in his truck in the parking lot. He calls his people on their cell phones. Only neither Kenny nor I have cell phones - - I think we're the last two holdouts on Earth. Well, they've been worrying him to death about these doors, and he's been making us nervous, coming up and hanging around on our job. We thought he was going to have another heart attack right there on the spot. What the big rush was, I don't know, because the ship isn't going out to sea, in fact, it's getting ready to come into our yard to be drydocked. He kept telling us, "We've got to be done here by Friday." That was last Friday. And he meant the doors had to be welded out, too. And what's more, somebody's started counting beans, so they wouldn't let us work overtime on this job.
Here's the way it works: some bozo in some office comes up with a date he wants a job finished, regardless of the realities of the situation. Then they tell you it has to be done by that date. Well, of course we work by the hour and we know the realities, so our attitude is, it'll get done when it gets done. (At least some of us see it that way. There are always some assholes, or newcomers, who are either scared or trying to suck up, who get themselves bent out of shape by these dictums.) But that's not the way the supervisors react. They're yes men, remember? They wouldn't dare try to explain why a job can't get done when the big shots say it must be done, or they wouldn't be supervisors for long. So what happened is that the bozo who came up with this completion schedule forgot that the ship had to de-fuel before coming into the ship yard, and when they are transferring fuel the Navy won't allow you to do any hotwork - - burning/plasma cutting, grinding, or welding. They've had hotwork cut off now for three days. We finally managed to finish fitting up the doors today, but they haven't even started welding them yet, and this afternoon Mack told me that now they won't do it until the ship comes into the yard, which means finished a week late - - three weeks instead of two - - if they're lucky.
That morning, before work, as some of us were sitting around the lunch table in the fabrication shop, Kenny the burner said they were sending him to that same ship, and I said, because Kenny always kids around about not wanting to work with me, "Well, I'm going down there with you." I meant it as a joke, but Kenny didn't know that. So you can imagine my surprise when Ronnie gave me the news.
Well, not real surprise, because I seem to have an uncanny knack for making a joke about something and then having it come true. I wasn't sorry to be sent on a job outside the yard. For one thing, the Naval base is closer to where I live so it means less commute time. And the atmosphere is always freer outside the yard - - not so many big shots and would-be big shots walking around. Not so many rules.
The thing that kills me, though, is that they sent me off without even asking for any turnover on my job - - that is to say, without my briefing my replacement on where things stood. The diagonal aluminum bulkhead. The job wasn't finished, and who knows who they might have given it to. I took it upon myself to pass on to Vince where I'd hidden two parts they'll need (so they wouldn't grow legs and walk away), but there's no telling if he'll remember, or even if he does, whether he'll tell whoever takes over the job. More wasted time while whoever it is figures things out.
Anyhow, now I'm down at the Naval base on a 'hot' job. Kenny and I are installing two new watertight doors. The supervisor there is Mack, an old fitter who they made a supervisor a couple of years ago. Last year he had a heart attack and had to have multiple by-pass surgery. He's supposed to take it easy, so he usually spends his time hanging out in his truck in the parking lot. He calls his people on their cell phones. Only neither Kenny nor I have cell phones - - I think we're the last two holdouts on Earth. Well, they've been worrying him to death about these doors, and he's been making us nervous, coming up and hanging around on our job. We thought he was going to have another heart attack right there on the spot. What the big rush was, I don't know, because the ship isn't going out to sea, in fact, it's getting ready to come into our yard to be drydocked. He kept telling us, "We've got to be done here by Friday." That was last Friday. And he meant the doors had to be welded out, too. And what's more, somebody's started counting beans, so they wouldn't let us work overtime on this job.
Here's the way it works: some bozo in some office comes up with a date he wants a job finished, regardless of the realities of the situation. Then they tell you it has to be done by that date. Well, of course we work by the hour and we know the realities, so our attitude is, it'll get done when it gets done. (At least some of us see it that way. There are always some assholes, or newcomers, who are either scared or trying to suck up, who get themselves bent out of shape by these dictums.) But that's not the way the supervisors react. They're yes men, remember? They wouldn't dare try to explain why a job can't get done when the big shots say it must be done, or they wouldn't be supervisors for long. So what happened is that the bozo who came up with this completion schedule forgot that the ship had to de-fuel before coming into the ship yard, and when they are transferring fuel the Navy won't allow you to do any hotwork - - burning/plasma cutting, grinding, or welding. They've had hotwork cut off now for three days. We finally managed to finish fitting up the doors today, but they haven't even started welding them yet, and this afternoon Mack told me that now they won't do it until the ship comes into the yard, which means finished a week late - - three weeks instead of two - - if they're lucky.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Sausagegate
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Petty corruption is common in the shipyard. I'm not talking about bribes, kickbacks, or that sort of thing. I mean corruption that takes the form of people engaging in business enterprises, legal or illegal, while on the company payroll, which means on the taxpayers dime, since almost all the work we do is Federal contracts.
People run gambling pools for football or basketball. There is, or I strongly suspect there is, prostitution. I've heard of instances of people being caught and fired for having sex while working (or supposed to be working) aboard ships. That's easy to do on night shift when there are few people around and practically no supervision. Knowing the people in the shipyard as I do, I'd strongly suspect that in a case like that a commercial transaction was involved. I also heard of a worker, or two workers sharing, who paid a firewatch $100 a week for sex on a regular basis. In that case I doubt that any sex took place on the job, but the transaction was certainly set up there. Anyhow, it gives an indication, tip of the iceberg so to speak.
I once had a firewatch working for me over a period of time, a black woman about 35. Her mother was career army, and she had lived all around the worlk. She she was unusually well-educated and well-spoken for a firewatch. We talked a lot, which upset another firewatch, a lesbian who had a crush on this woman. My firewatch didn't have a car, and since she lived along my route home, I offered her a ride. On the way, she asked if we could stop at a 7-Eleven and asked me for a couple of bucks to pay for whatever it was she wanted. I gave her rides a couple more times, but stopped when I saw that the mooching was becoming a regular habit. Some weeks later I learned that she'd been arrested for prostitution and her lesbian friend had been bailed her out. I never heard anybody accuse that woman of hustling on the job, but I mention her story because I'm sure there are others like her among the firewatches, the lowest echelon of female shipyard workers, who rely on casual or part time prostitution to supplement their otherwise erratic income.
Another form of corruption in the shipyard involves union officials. When I first came to work at the place where I work now, 30 years ago (I left after 5 years, then returned many years later), the union president was a welder. The company gave him an especially easy job. He never had to go out on a ship, but stayed in the welding shop all day and did little gravy jobs from time to time. He had a refrigerator there, and sold sodas and snacks. He had his gravy job and ran his little side-line business with the full knowledge of the company. You think he accepted those favors from the company and didn't give them anything back?
The current vice-president of the union is also a supervisor, in name at least, which to me is a conflict of interest in itself. He has the rank and pay of a supervisor, But the real reason he has it is that he's a so-called 'apprentice instructor.' In reality he does little or no instructing of the apprentices. All he does is monitor their attendance, disciplinary problems they may have, and the notebooks in which they are supposed to record what they have done on the job. But he is in a position of power over them. The union pays a bounty of $20 or $30 per head for each new union member that someone signs up (we're in a 'right-to-work' state). So this guy uses his authority over the apprentices to get them to join the union, then collects the bounty on them. It probably doesn't amount to much money over the course of a year, a few hundred bucks at most. But he also uses his position to get overtime work whenever he wants it, although he does almost nothing when he does comes in on overtime apart from walking around and acting like a big-shot. Using their position to arrange overtime for themselves is something many of the supervisors do, by the way.
But here's the case I wanted to talk about. My job was shut down temporarily so we could concentrate on jobs that have to be finished for 'PCD,' or 'partial completion date.' Yesterday Starner had me helping Vince. But this morning he told to help Harry Edwards, the crew leader, who's working under Marc Malloy, not Starner. Night shift had put in a large, curved side plate of thick aluminum. They'd 'made up' (fitted together flush) the butts, or the edges of the plate, but hadn't pulled it in to the longitudinal beam that is part of the framework of the ship. Edwards wanted me to fix it, which meant undoing almost everything that night shift had done and doing it over again. That wasn't difficult, but the odd thing was that Edwards already had three fitters and an apprentice working on this job, not to mention a welder. I ended up supervising all these people as well as working with the tools myself, which is what the crew leader is supposed to do. So I'm thinking, well, they must be giving Edwards too much to do if he can't be here taking care of this himself.
When we had the job most of the way finished, I went looking for Edwards to report. That was at 11:10 am, 50 minutes before lunch. I couldn't find him anywhere, but I ran into Marc Malloy and asked him if he'd seen him. "No," he said, "But he's probably back in the shop making his food." What he was talking about was that Edwards sells sausage and onion sandwiches at lunch time from the locker room over the fabrication shop. These he prepares using one of those big, banquet size slow cookers.
I'd known about this little sideline of Edwards's, because I'd seen him doing it one day when I came to work around 11:30 am after a doctor's appointment. At the time I wondered how he got away with it, but I didn't think about it any more until sometime later when I ran into him collecting money, during working hours, for his football pool. He was doing it right out in the open - - in the supervisors' trailer. I've heard that a lot of the supervisors are Edwards's lunch-time customers, including Bobby Lee Palmer, the assistant foreman of our department. Go figure.
Petty corruption is common in the shipyard. I'm not talking about bribes, kickbacks, or that sort of thing. I mean corruption that takes the form of people engaging in business enterprises, legal or illegal, while on the company payroll, which means on the taxpayers dime, since almost all the work we do is Federal contracts.
People run gambling pools for football or basketball. There is, or I strongly suspect there is, prostitution. I've heard of instances of people being caught and fired for having sex while working (or supposed to be working) aboard ships. That's easy to do on night shift when there are few people around and practically no supervision. Knowing the people in the shipyard as I do, I'd strongly suspect that in a case like that a commercial transaction was involved. I also heard of a worker, or two workers sharing, who paid a firewatch $100 a week for sex on a regular basis. In that case I doubt that any sex took place on the job, but the transaction was certainly set up there. Anyhow, it gives an indication, tip of the iceberg so to speak.
I once had a firewatch working for me over a period of time, a black woman about 35. Her mother was career army, and she had lived all around the worlk. She she was unusually well-educated and well-spoken for a firewatch. We talked a lot, which upset another firewatch, a lesbian who had a crush on this woman. My firewatch didn't have a car, and since she lived along my route home, I offered her a ride. On the way, she asked if we could stop at a 7-Eleven and asked me for a couple of bucks to pay for whatever it was she wanted. I gave her rides a couple more times, but stopped when I saw that the mooching was becoming a regular habit. Some weeks later I learned that she'd been arrested for prostitution and her lesbian friend had been bailed her out. I never heard anybody accuse that woman of hustling on the job, but I mention her story because I'm sure there are others like her among the firewatches, the lowest echelon of female shipyard workers, who rely on casual or part time prostitution to supplement their otherwise erratic income.
Another form of corruption in the shipyard involves union officials. When I first came to work at the place where I work now, 30 years ago (I left after 5 years, then returned many years later), the union president was a welder. The company gave him an especially easy job. He never had to go out on a ship, but stayed in the welding shop all day and did little gravy jobs from time to time. He had a refrigerator there, and sold sodas and snacks. He had his gravy job and ran his little side-line business with the full knowledge of the company. You think he accepted those favors from the company and didn't give them anything back?
The current vice-president of the union is also a supervisor, in name at least, which to me is a conflict of interest in itself. He has the rank and pay of a supervisor, But the real reason he has it is that he's a so-called 'apprentice instructor.' In reality he does little or no instructing of the apprentices. All he does is monitor their attendance, disciplinary problems they may have, and the notebooks in which they are supposed to record what they have done on the job. But he is in a position of power over them. The union pays a bounty of $20 or $30 per head for each new union member that someone signs up (we're in a 'right-to-work' state). So this guy uses his authority over the apprentices to get them to join the union, then collects the bounty on them. It probably doesn't amount to much money over the course of a year, a few hundred bucks at most. But he also uses his position to get overtime work whenever he wants it, although he does almost nothing when he does comes in on overtime apart from walking around and acting like a big-shot. Using their position to arrange overtime for themselves is something many of the supervisors do, by the way.
But here's the case I wanted to talk about. My job was shut down temporarily so we could concentrate on jobs that have to be finished for 'PCD,' or 'partial completion date.' Yesterday Starner had me helping Vince. But this morning he told to help Harry Edwards, the crew leader, who's working under Marc Malloy, not Starner. Night shift had put in a large, curved side plate of thick aluminum. They'd 'made up' (fitted together flush) the butts, or the edges of the plate, but hadn't pulled it in to the longitudinal beam that is part of the framework of the ship. Edwards wanted me to fix it, which meant undoing almost everything that night shift had done and doing it over again. That wasn't difficult, but the odd thing was that Edwards already had three fitters and an apprentice working on this job, not to mention a welder. I ended up supervising all these people as well as working with the tools myself, which is what the crew leader is supposed to do. So I'm thinking, well, they must be giving Edwards too much to do if he can't be here taking care of this himself.
When we had the job most of the way finished, I went looking for Edwards to report. That was at 11:10 am, 50 minutes before lunch. I couldn't find him anywhere, but I ran into Marc Malloy and asked him if he'd seen him. "No," he said, "But he's probably back in the shop making his food." What he was talking about was that Edwards sells sausage and onion sandwiches at lunch time from the locker room over the fabrication shop. These he prepares using one of those big, banquet size slow cookers.
I'd known about this little sideline of Edwards's, because I'd seen him doing it one day when I came to work around 11:30 am after a doctor's appointment. At the time I wondered how he got away with it, but I didn't think about it any more until sometime later when I ran into him collecting money, during working hours, for his football pool. He was doing it right out in the open - - in the supervisors' trailer. I've heard that a lot of the supervisors are Edwards's lunch-time customers, including Bobby Lee Palmer, the assistant foreman of our department. Go figure.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Hot
Thursday, March 26, 2009
For several weeks I've been working in the same space - - what formerly was two spaces, now being combined into one in what the Navy calls a 'shipalt.' For the first few days I was partnered with Elmore Sr., but Starner, my supervisor, moved him to other jobs, working with his son. Since then, I've been on my own, working alone except for the occasional welder (with his firewatches), who I need to tack weld for me.
On steel work we shipfitters generally do our own tacking, but on this aluminum work, which they deem 'critical,' the Navy requires that all welding, even tack welding of temporary attachments, to be done by a welder certified in the process to be used, in this case wire feed (MIG) welding machines.
I have installed a diagonal bulkhead, which will have a wire cage door in it, in place of the solid, jogged bulkhead that existed before. I have also installed an insert to close up the hole left from removing a door from the p-way that used to access the office that is no more.
Yesterday I was on a roll. I worked solid all day, practically without a break except for lunch, 'inserting' (or closing off) two large cut-outs in the top of the new diagonal bulkhead. These cut-outs were the result of a design screw up on the part of the shipyard contracted by the Navy to do the design work on this shipalt. Whoever did it envisioned a bundle of cables passing in one side of the new bulkhead and out the other. It made no sense, because there wasn't any reason for the cables to enter the space at all.
My 'buddy' Joe had started this job, and going by the print he had raised the bulkhead plate with the cables looping in one side and out the other. Getting this bulkhead in was a pain because of criss-crossed beams in the overhead and the fact that the plate isn't flat but rolled about 45 degrees on each end, not to mention the various other obstructions. Anyhow, I was the one who pointed out the screw up, although reps from the Navy and the design contractor had both scratched their heads at seeing the cables go in one side and out the other. I took the plate out again to remove the cables so they could pass in a straight line outside the bulkhead.
Anyhow, as I was saying, I worked hard all day yesterday fitting up the plates to close off the cut-outs. Apart from the cables and pipes and other stuff in the way, this was no easy task because of the joint design our welding department came up with to make it easier for themselves but harder for us. This joint design calls for a 3/16" gap where the plates butt together, and each of the plates must be beveled 30 degrees on the edge. All this is to facilitate weld penetration. They then weld the joint using a removable ceramic back-up strip behind the butt. For fit-up then, the insert has to 'float' in the hole so to speak. Holding the 3/16" gap while aligning the plates is difficult, not to mention tedious, and requires special procedures. So yesterday I completed one plate start to finish, including cutting it to size, and got the other one about 80% done. But when I came in to work this morning I found that they had taken my welder away and the weld supervisor refused to give me another one. So I was pretty much stuck - - another wasted day, so far as production was concerned - - apart from some clean-up.
So today I was totally alone. Sometimes that isn't a bad thing. One day last week - - St. Patrick's Day, in fact - - I had two welders in the space with me - - both of them trying to give me shit about my fitting. Some of the welders are crybabies, including these two. They think my job is catering to them, to make things as easy for them as possible. (The biggest crybaby of the two is the son of one of the department foremen. I call him "Prince Philip.")
Then there was the heater. The Navy requires that the aluminum we're working be at a minimum of 60 degrees before welding. That isn't a big problem now because the temperature outside the ship has been 50 degrees or more lately. But we have a big 440 volt electric blower heater in the space to use when necessary, and it can bring the aluminum up to temperature in a few minutes. The problem is that some of the firewatches, especially the women, think the heater is there to keep them warm and they want it blasting all the time. It gets too hot for me to work. That day I had to battle them, too. Every time I'd shut the heater off, they'd turn it on again. That's the way it went all day.
For several weeks I've been working in the same space - - what formerly was two spaces, now being combined into one in what the Navy calls a 'shipalt.' For the first few days I was partnered with Elmore Sr., but Starner, my supervisor, moved him to other jobs, working with his son. Since then, I've been on my own, working alone except for the occasional welder (with his firewatches), who I need to tack weld for me.
On steel work we shipfitters generally do our own tacking, but on this aluminum work, which they deem 'critical,' the Navy requires that all welding, even tack welding of temporary attachments, to be done by a welder certified in the process to be used, in this case wire feed (MIG) welding machines.
I have installed a diagonal bulkhead, which will have a wire cage door in it, in place of the solid, jogged bulkhead that existed before. I have also installed an insert to close up the hole left from removing a door from the p-way that used to access the office that is no more.
Yesterday I was on a roll. I worked solid all day, practically without a break except for lunch, 'inserting' (or closing off) two large cut-outs in the top of the new diagonal bulkhead. These cut-outs were the result of a design screw up on the part of the shipyard contracted by the Navy to do the design work on this shipalt. Whoever did it envisioned a bundle of cables passing in one side of the new bulkhead and out the other. It made no sense, because there wasn't any reason for the cables to enter the space at all.
My 'buddy' Joe had started this job, and going by the print he had raised the bulkhead plate with the cables looping in one side and out the other. Getting this bulkhead in was a pain because of criss-crossed beams in the overhead and the fact that the plate isn't flat but rolled about 45 degrees on each end, not to mention the various other obstructions. Anyhow, I was the one who pointed out the screw up, although reps from the Navy and the design contractor had both scratched their heads at seeing the cables go in one side and out the other. I took the plate out again to remove the cables so they could pass in a straight line outside the bulkhead.
Anyhow, as I was saying, I worked hard all day yesterday fitting up the plates to close off the cut-outs. Apart from the cables and pipes and other stuff in the way, this was no easy task because of the joint design our welding department came up with to make it easier for themselves but harder for us. This joint design calls for a 3/16" gap where the plates butt together, and each of the plates must be beveled 30 degrees on the edge. All this is to facilitate weld penetration. They then weld the joint using a removable ceramic back-up strip behind the butt. For fit-up then, the insert has to 'float' in the hole so to speak. Holding the 3/16" gap while aligning the plates is difficult, not to mention tedious, and requires special procedures. So yesterday I completed one plate start to finish, including cutting it to size, and got the other one about 80% done. But when I came in to work this morning I found that they had taken my welder away and the weld supervisor refused to give me another one. So I was pretty much stuck - - another wasted day, so far as production was concerned - - apart from some clean-up.
So today I was totally alone. Sometimes that isn't a bad thing. One day last week - - St. Patrick's Day, in fact - - I had two welders in the space with me - - both of them trying to give me shit about my fitting. Some of the welders are crybabies, including these two. They think my job is catering to them, to make things as easy for them as possible. (The biggest crybaby of the two is the son of one of the department foremen. I call him "Prince Philip.")
Then there was the heater. The Navy requires that the aluminum we're working be at a minimum of 60 degrees before welding. That isn't a big problem now because the temperature outside the ship has been 50 degrees or more lately. But we have a big 440 volt electric blower heater in the space to use when necessary, and it can bring the aluminum up to temperature in a few minutes. The problem is that some of the firewatches, especially the women, think the heater is there to keep them warm and they want it blasting all the time. It gets too hot for me to work. That day I had to battle them, too. Every time I'd shut the heater off, they'd turn it on again. That's the way it went all day.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Obama's Going To Give It To Us Anyway
For the past couple of weeks Starner has foregone his morning harangues, but he must have taken some stupid pills, because this week he's back with a vengeance. The ship came out of drydock on Monday. This is an important milestone in one of these major repair/overhaul evolutions, as it means the work to the underwater hull is now complete. Drydocking a ship is a very expensive proposition and the Navy gets upset if it doesn't happen on time. (In this case, it was some days late, but I'm not sure how that will pan out, because at least some of the delay was caused by the need for some unforeseen repairs to one of the struts that holds the starboard propulsion shaft.)
Anyhow, here is a representative quote from Starner's tirade this morning: "This ain't no joyride. The fun and games is over. We got a ship to get out. I don't know about you, but I like my job here. We gotta get this ship outta here. I been doin' this shit for 25 years, ever since I graduated high school." He was joined by Ronnie Wilson, who lectured us again on absenteeism, especially on weekends. Yesterday he told us that last weekend, of 39 people scheduled to work, only 20 showed up. They also told us that 10-hour days were now mandatory, but when I left at 4 pm (after 8 hours), they had marked 8 hours on my time card. Go figure.
One of those who did stay over today was Joe, ever willing to be the yes-man. At about 3:30 I ran into him standing around shooting the shit with a couple of contractors who've been helping him. Echoing Starner, I said in jest, "What are you all standing around bullshitting for? We've got a ship to get out." Joe answered something to the effect of "what else have we got to do, we're working till 6?" So I said, "You're just going to steal the taxpayers' money, huh?" "I do it every day," Joe replied. "Obama's going to give it to us anyway," one of the contractors put in.
Anyhow, here is a representative quote from Starner's tirade this morning: "This ain't no joyride. The fun and games is over. We got a ship to get out. I don't know about you, but I like my job here. We gotta get this ship outta here. I been doin' this shit for 25 years, ever since I graduated high school." He was joined by Ronnie Wilson, who lectured us again on absenteeism, especially on weekends. Yesterday he told us that last weekend, of 39 people scheduled to work, only 20 showed up. They also told us that 10-hour days were now mandatory, but when I left at 4 pm (after 8 hours), they had marked 8 hours on my time card. Go figure.
One of those who did stay over today was Joe, ever willing to be the yes-man. At about 3:30 I ran into him standing around shooting the shit with a couple of contractors who've been helping him. Echoing Starner, I said in jest, "What are you all standing around bullshitting for? We've got a ship to get out." Joe answered something to the effect of "what else have we got to do, we're working till 6?" So I said, "You're just going to steal the taxpayers' money, huh?" "I do it every day," Joe replied. "Obama's going to give it to us anyway," one of the contractors put in.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Crazy
"Things are starting to get crazy around here," Starner, my nominal supervisor, told me one day last week. "They're always crazy here," I replied. "We were supposed to have finished Sunday," he said. I didn't comment on this. I assumed he was referring to the aluminum part of the work our yard is doing, the repairs and "mods" to the ship's aluminum superstructure.
Even though Starner is practically useless - - he checks with me first thing in the morning, then disappears for the rest of the day - - at least he's no longer disrespecting me by assigning me to jobs that aren't up to my skill level. As for craziness, they've been trying to work the job seven days a week, 10 hours a day - - bringing some people in two hours early, while others have been working over two hours in the afternoon. I could do this if I wanted, but I don't. (Forty-eight hours a week is pretty much my max.) I don't know what these people do with their money. Most skilled workers in our yard gross over 40k per year on straight time. If they're married, most of their spouses work, also, often earning more than they do. Together, that's a pretty good family income. I guess they waste their money on a lot of stupid shit.
But working these hours always brings the same result - -people "laying out" even more than they normally would. Elmore, for example, worked the previous Saturday and Sunday for overtime pay, then laid out Monday and Tuesday (straight time pay). His son came in Monday but laid out Tuesday.
And we have the usual chaos. Most of the day Starner made his "crazy" statement, I spent waiting for a welder. One of the welding supervisors promised me a certain welder after he finished another job. Then the other welding supervisor took him and put him on something else. So the first one promised me I'd have a welder first thing the next day. But then he didn't come to work the next day and the second welding supervisor wouldn't honor the other's promise. For efficient production the shipfitting and welding needs to be coordinated and organized rationally. Where I work that rarely happens.
Yesterday I had a welder, but he couldn't weld because the riggers had removed from the ship the bottles of shielding gas for the wire-feed (MIG) welding machines used in the aluminum work. They did this in preparation for taking the ship out of drydock. But that's not happening for several days at least. So then they put a rack of bottles back on, but it turns out it was the rack of empties. I finally got the job done today. Who pays for this disorganization and inefficiency? The taxpayer, of course. Mr. Obama, are you reading this?
Even though Starner is practically useless - - he checks with me first thing in the morning, then disappears for the rest of the day - - at least he's no longer disrespecting me by assigning me to jobs that aren't up to my skill level. As for craziness, they've been trying to work the job seven days a week, 10 hours a day - - bringing some people in two hours early, while others have been working over two hours in the afternoon. I could do this if I wanted, but I don't. (Forty-eight hours a week is pretty much my max.) I don't know what these people do with their money. Most skilled workers in our yard gross over 40k per year on straight time. If they're married, most of their spouses work, also, often earning more than they do. Together, that's a pretty good family income. I guess they waste their money on a lot of stupid shit.
But working these hours always brings the same result - -people "laying out" even more than they normally would. Elmore, for example, worked the previous Saturday and Sunday for overtime pay, then laid out Monday and Tuesday (straight time pay). His son came in Monday but laid out Tuesday.
And we have the usual chaos. Most of the day Starner made his "crazy" statement, I spent waiting for a welder. One of the welding supervisors promised me a certain welder after he finished another job. Then the other welding supervisor took him and put him on something else. So the first one promised me I'd have a welder first thing the next day. But then he didn't come to work the next day and the second welding supervisor wouldn't honor the other's promise. For efficient production the shipfitting and welding needs to be coordinated and organized rationally. Where I work that rarely happens.
Yesterday I had a welder, but he couldn't weld because the riggers had removed from the ship the bottles of shielding gas for the wire-feed (MIG) welding machines used in the aluminum work. They did this in preparation for taking the ship out of drydock. But that's not happening for several days at least. So then they put a rack of bottles back on, but it turns out it was the rack of empties. I finally got the job done today. Who pays for this disorganization and inefficiency? The taxpayer, of course. Mr. Obama, are you reading this?
Monday, March 16, 2009
Joe's Story
The supervisors' office for the shipfitters and welders is located in a loft over the structural fabrication shop. It's reached by a flight of wooden stairs about two stories high. Today, Bobby Lee Palmer, the assistant foreman for shipfitters, who must have been up and down thousands of times, fell down that flight of stairs. He was taken out of the shipyard in an ambulance. They say one of his legs just gave way. Nobody that I talked to knew his condition. Bobby Lee isn't a popular guy. His main responsibility is assigning manpower to our various jobs, which isn't very demanding. When he's not doing that he tends to harass people for petty stuff. He's not noted for intelligence.
It's been weeks now since I've worked with Joe. But he's working in the same area, so I see him every day. On Saturday I'd stopped in to the space where Vince is working to borrow a reciprocating saw. Joe was there, just kibitzing. Kidding with Vince, I used a few words of Spanish, which I explained to Joe. But he said he already knew them, that he'd taken three years of Spanish in high school. This really surprised me, because Joe's not the kind of guy who'd strike you as a scholar. Well, in the discussion that followed, I learned that Joe had graduated from a local university with business degree, which was even more surprising.
Later, when I ran into Joe again, I followed up on the subject of what he was doing working in the shipyard. He told me he'd been a manager for one of the big package delivery services. But a neighbor of his, a representative for a tool manufacturer, who received regular package deliveries through Joe's company, told Joe that the packages, which were left on his front porch, sometimes disappeared. He asked Joe if he could watch out for them and bring them with him when he came home from work, rather than having them delivered by the truck. Joe was happy to do this service for his neighbor. It turned out that the packages didn't contain tool samples from the neighbor's company, they were shipments of meth-amphetamines from California. The DEA, which was already on to the neighbor, had one of its agents driving the truck that made the deliveries - - that is, until the packages that Joe had intercepted were no longer showing up on the truck. Joe was arrested and charged with conspiracy to deliver drugs across state lines.
Joe's lawyer got the charged reduced to simple possession and got Joe released on parole without jail time. But then Joe got ticketed for DWI, and because that was a violation of his parole, he was sent to prison for a year and a half. He first came to our shipyard on work release, to work as a firewatch.
It's been weeks now since I've worked with Joe. But he's working in the same area, so I see him every day. On Saturday I'd stopped in to the space where Vince is working to borrow a reciprocating saw. Joe was there, just kibitzing. Kidding with Vince, I used a few words of Spanish, which I explained to Joe. But he said he already knew them, that he'd taken three years of Spanish in high school. This really surprised me, because Joe's not the kind of guy who'd strike you as a scholar. Well, in the discussion that followed, I learned that Joe had graduated from a local university with business degree, which was even more surprising.
Later, when I ran into Joe again, I followed up on the subject of what he was doing working in the shipyard. He told me he'd been a manager for one of the big package delivery services. But a neighbor of his, a representative for a tool manufacturer, who received regular package deliveries through Joe's company, told Joe that the packages, which were left on his front porch, sometimes disappeared. He asked Joe if he could watch out for them and bring them with him when he came home from work, rather than having them delivered by the truck. Joe was happy to do this service for his neighbor. It turned out that the packages didn't contain tool samples from the neighbor's company, they were shipments of meth-amphetamines from California. The DEA, which was already on to the neighbor, had one of its agents driving the truck that made the deliveries - - that is, until the packages that Joe had intercepted were no longer showing up on the truck. Joe was arrested and charged with conspiracy to deliver drugs across state lines.
Joe's lawyer got the charged reduced to simple possession and got Joe released on parole without jail time. But then Joe got ticketed for DWI, and because that was a violation of his parole, he was sent to prison for a year and a half. He first came to our shipyard on work release, to work as a firewatch.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Almost Killed In The Safety Office
This morning I had to go to the safety office. As I entered the single-story building, one of the safety inspectors was standing outside smoking a cigarette (duh!). Inside was the secretary and another inspector working at his computer terminal.
Just as I finished my business the inspector who'd been outside came in and told us that we had all just barely escaped being killed. We thought he was making a of joke. But no. Outside, 80 or 100 feet away, a tanker truck with a load of compressed oxygen was filling the yard storage tank. According to the inspector, who had witnessed the event, one of the landscapers contracted by the yard drove his riding mower under the trailer of the oxygen tanker. Apparently the tanker was parked athwart the roadway, blocking it. But - - so claimed the inspector - - the landscaper had not one but two lit cigarettes - - one in his mouth and one in his hand (talk about rednecks!), and the pure, medical grade compressed oxygen is highly explosive. Smoking in the vicinity when it's being transferred from one container to another is a real no-no. The truck driver took off running. With landscapers like this, who needs Al Qaida?
The safety inspector said that security guards were escorting the two-butt landscaper out of the. This is the last time I'll ever come to the safety office, I said, and they all laughed. Gallows humor.
Just as I finished my business the inspector who'd been outside came in and told us that we had all just barely escaped being killed. We thought he was making a of joke. But no. Outside, 80 or 100 feet away, a tanker truck with a load of compressed oxygen was filling the yard storage tank. According to the inspector, who had witnessed the event, one of the landscapers contracted by the yard drove his riding mower under the trailer of the oxygen tanker. Apparently the tanker was parked athwart the roadway, blocking it. But - - so claimed the inspector - - the landscaper had not one but two lit cigarettes - - one in his mouth and one in his hand (talk about rednecks!), and the pure, medical grade compressed oxygen is highly explosive. Smoking in the vicinity when it's being transferred from one container to another is a real no-no. The truck driver took off running. With landscapers like this, who needs Al Qaida?
The safety inspector said that security guards were escorting the two-butt landscaper out of the. This is the last time I'll ever come to the safety office, I said, and they all laughed. Gallows humor.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Nine Lives?
Today, as a bunch of us were waiting for the end of shift whistle to leave the boat, one of the firewatches was talking to a guy in my department about back troubles. He was a black man, I’d guess in his late 40s, not a contractor, but a laborer who works for our company. He said he’d had to have a back operation for a crushed disc. This had been the second back operation he’d had. In fact, he said, he’d had just about every operation there was. An exaggeration, no doubt, but he said he’d had brain surgery for an anurism, and claimed to have had his "whole belly" opened up, drawing a line with his finger almost from his groin to his rib cage. I didn’t catch what all that had been for, but I think a hernia may have been part of it, but obviously something more serious as well. Then he went on to say that in addition to the surgeries, he’d been shot twice and had his throat cut twice. I expressed surprise at this, and he said his own brother had cut his throat one time. "Wow," I said, "You must have really pissed him off for him to want to cut your throat." He said it was because he tried to throw his brother out of his house. The brother was a "bad drunk," who apparently was freeloading. He also said his brother had served nine years in prison for shooting somebody in the face. The man said his survival through all of this was due to the intervention of God. "I’m blessed," he said. As I left, some of his friends were urging him to "give testimony."
Sunday, March 1, 2009
But Who's In Charge?
Thursday, February 26, 2009
I’ve decided I’ve got to stop beating up on Starner. I mean in this blog. But before I do, I have to note that he was late to work again today. I don’t know how late, but it must have been very late, because I didn’t see him on the ship, on the pier, or in the office trailer all day. I didn’t see him until quitting time when he was handing out the checks. Not that I missed him. The various supervisors visiting my job are a pain in the ass because I have to stop working and explain what I’m doing. Today was a good day because I only remember two stopping by. Usually I get four or more.
One who stopped by today was Eric Hall. He’s in overall charge for my department, the shipfitters, on this particular ship. His visit was actually useful, because they still haven’t solved the problem of how many firewatches we need on the ship (rocket science?), so Elmore and I had a welder but he couldn’t do anything because we didn’t have any firewatches. Eric managed to get us one and arrange for us to share another with Vince. It’s not often that a supervisor gives us any help. The other visitor was ship superintendent Saul Gannatt, who’s been given the nickname "Rudolph" (as in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer) because of his red nose. Actually Rudolph’s nose, and whole face, is more purple and liverish than red in my opinion - - a mass of burst blood vessels, presumably the result of alcohol. A ship superintendent, by the way, is over all the trades, not just my department, as well as the subcontractors. Gannatt is actually a subordinate of the lead ship superintendent. There are four or five of them in all, and supposedly they have the various work items on the ship divided up between them.
Which brings me to the question of organization and chain of command. Chain of command, division of labor, delegation of responsibility - - to me these are basic components of organization. But they seem to be unknown concepts where I work. It continually amazes me that they don’t understand chain of command given that so many of the big shots come out of the Navy, and the company worships (or pretends to worship) the Navy. Sucks up to the Navy might be more accurate. For example, every year at the time of the Army-Navy football game they put up a big banner at the entrance to the yard, "Go Navy, Beat Army." Anyhow, we have all these supervisors but for the most part they have no clear delineation of responsibility. They all seem to operate independently. A couple of weeks ago I had two welding supervisors tell me two contrary things about the weld joint design for the butt joints in a bulkhead I was working with Joe. So I asked one of them, Henry, which one was in charge. I didn’t want to argue about this stuff all day and I wanted to know who to go to for a definitive answer. Henry’s answer was that they were both in charge. How can they both be in charge? Obviously they weren’t on the same page and they weren’t comparing notes. Now for the shipfitters I think there are seven supervisors on my ship. One of them, Tim Babbit, has been out sick for weeks. He’s overweight, sedentary, has diabetes, a heart condition, and who knows what else. He’s on numerous medications, along with his wife, and it seems like he’s been out for most of the past year. Jack Barnes is younger than Tim, but he’s also overweight and has health problems. He didn’t come to work today, and he "lays out," as we say, quite a lot. When he comes up on the ship he moves like an old man. He and Hilton Dines are the only ones who don’t visit my job, but it is Hilton alone who ever seems to have anything to do. Then there’s Starner, who you already know about. In name at least, he is my supervisor. There’s also Eric Hall, who I’ve mentioned, but he only stops by every few days. Ditto Ronnie Wilson, who is nominally under Eric, and Marc Malloy, a retired Navy chief petty officer and heavy smoker, whose place in the pecking order is vague, at least to me. I should also mention Bobby Lee Palmer, the assistant department foreman, who comes up on the ship frequently. Oh, and I should mention Harry Edwards, a crew leader (the lowest echelon of supervisor). So far as I know, I’m not part of his crew, but he comes on my job, apparently to check up on me, anyhow. None of them seem to have any contact with each other from the standpoint of chain of command or division of labor, since any of them might stop by and give me orders. If they’re under pressure from somebody they’ll do this often. If not, they don’t seem to care what I’m doing.
Meanwhile Elmore and I have been keeping ourselves pretty busy, moving the job along despite the obstacles and interference. I prefer to stay busy because it makes the day go fast. I try to do a good job for my own sake, as a sort of hobby. It’s the stupidity that gets to me. And the waste of money.
I’ve decided I’ve got to stop beating up on Starner. I mean in this blog. But before I do, I have to note that he was late to work again today. I don’t know how late, but it must have been very late, because I didn’t see him on the ship, on the pier, or in the office trailer all day. I didn’t see him until quitting time when he was handing out the checks. Not that I missed him. The various supervisors visiting my job are a pain in the ass because I have to stop working and explain what I’m doing. Today was a good day because I only remember two stopping by. Usually I get four or more.
One who stopped by today was Eric Hall. He’s in overall charge for my department, the shipfitters, on this particular ship. His visit was actually useful, because they still haven’t solved the problem of how many firewatches we need on the ship (rocket science?), so Elmore and I had a welder but he couldn’t do anything because we didn’t have any firewatches. Eric managed to get us one and arrange for us to share another with Vince. It’s not often that a supervisor gives us any help. The other visitor was ship superintendent Saul Gannatt, who’s been given the nickname "Rudolph" (as in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer) because of his red nose. Actually Rudolph’s nose, and whole face, is more purple and liverish than red in my opinion - - a mass of burst blood vessels, presumably the result of alcohol. A ship superintendent, by the way, is over all the trades, not just my department, as well as the subcontractors. Gannatt is actually a subordinate of the lead ship superintendent. There are four or five of them in all, and supposedly they have the various work items on the ship divided up between them.
Which brings me to the question of organization and chain of command. Chain of command, division of labor, delegation of responsibility - - to me these are basic components of organization. But they seem to be unknown concepts where I work. It continually amazes me that they don’t understand chain of command given that so many of the big shots come out of the Navy, and the company worships (or pretends to worship) the Navy. Sucks up to the Navy might be more accurate. For example, every year at the time of the Army-Navy football game they put up a big banner at the entrance to the yard, "Go Navy, Beat Army." Anyhow, we have all these supervisors but for the most part they have no clear delineation of responsibility. They all seem to operate independently. A couple of weeks ago I had two welding supervisors tell me two contrary things about the weld joint design for the butt joints in a bulkhead I was working with Joe. So I asked one of them, Henry, which one was in charge. I didn’t want to argue about this stuff all day and I wanted to know who to go to for a definitive answer. Henry’s answer was that they were both in charge. How can they both be in charge? Obviously they weren’t on the same page and they weren’t comparing notes. Now for the shipfitters I think there are seven supervisors on my ship. One of them, Tim Babbit, has been out sick for weeks. He’s overweight, sedentary, has diabetes, a heart condition, and who knows what else. He’s on numerous medications, along with his wife, and it seems like he’s been out for most of the past year. Jack Barnes is younger than Tim, but he’s also overweight and has health problems. He didn’t come to work today, and he "lays out," as we say, quite a lot. When he comes up on the ship he moves like an old man. He and Hilton Dines are the only ones who don’t visit my job, but it is Hilton alone who ever seems to have anything to do. Then there’s Starner, who you already know about. In name at least, he is my supervisor. There’s also Eric Hall, who I’ve mentioned, but he only stops by every few days. Ditto Ronnie Wilson, who is nominally under Eric, and Marc Malloy, a retired Navy chief petty officer and heavy smoker, whose place in the pecking order is vague, at least to me. I should also mention Bobby Lee Palmer, the assistant department foreman, who comes up on the ship frequently. Oh, and I should mention Harry Edwards, a crew leader (the lowest echelon of supervisor). So far as I know, I’m not part of his crew, but he comes on my job, apparently to check up on me, anyhow. None of them seem to have any contact with each other from the standpoint of chain of command or division of labor, since any of them might stop by and give me orders. If they’re under pressure from somebody they’ll do this often. If not, they don’t seem to care what I’m doing.
Meanwhile Elmore and I have been keeping ourselves pretty busy, moving the job along despite the obstacles and interference. I prefer to stay busy because it makes the day go fast. I try to do a good job for my own sake, as a sort of hobby. It’s the stupidity that gets to me. And the waste of money.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Salamanders
This morning was our monthly safety meeting, held in the structural department fabrication shop, a building about 200 feet long by 100 feet wide and maybe 35 feet to the roof. 350 or so workers standing on the concrete and steel plate floor for 40 minutes listening to the company safety manager drone on with his cordless microphone. Or not listening (or not hearing) because either the mike wasn’t up to the task or his mike technique needs work, because it was impossible to hear anything he said except an occasional snippet. In one of these audible snippets he informed us that our eyes wouldn’t grow back if we lost them. (Did we think we were salamanders?) That was enough to satisfy me that I wasn’t missing anything by not being able to hear.
Starner, my supervisor, came back to work today after laying out Monday and Tuesday. He’s the one who last week lectured us on not missing time. Must have been some of his problems getting the best of him, because he showed no sign of being sick when I last saw him on Saturday, nor did he show any sign of being ill today.
Speaking of seeing him on Saturday, he did something strange. He was really pushing the part of the job that Vince has been working on, such that on Saturday he told me to help Vince rather than working my own job. Then, while I stood there, the two of them spent a long time reminiscing about an out of town job they had worked together, where Vince had paid a Hooters waitress $50 for her outfit - - top and shorts - - and how she had gone right then and there to the bathroom and changed out of them for him. What he did with these togs he didn’t say and I didn’t ask. But he insisted on pulling up a photo of himself with her on his cell phone. Well, this whole thing was weird - - both Vince with the Hooters outfit and Starner wasting all that time shooting the bull about it. During this same interlude, Starner showed that he, too, was no stranger to sexual weirdness. He was talking to Vince about doing something that required him to get into a tight spot, and Starner said by way of encouragement, "I could get in there with my 275 pounds," or something to that effect. Then he added, "and 50 pounds of dick." This comment came out of the clear blue. There were no women present (who he might have imagined to be interested in this information), and I’m reasonably sure Starner isn’t gay. Or maybe it was a delayed response to the Hooters discussion. Fortunately, Joe came in late Saturday and Starner put him with Vince. He sent me back to my own job.
Starner, my supervisor, came back to work today after laying out Monday and Tuesday. He’s the one who last week lectured us on not missing time. Must have been some of his problems getting the best of him, because he showed no sign of being sick when I last saw him on Saturday, nor did he show any sign of being ill today.
Speaking of seeing him on Saturday, he did something strange. He was really pushing the part of the job that Vince has been working on, such that on Saturday he told me to help Vince rather than working my own job. Then, while I stood there, the two of them spent a long time reminiscing about an out of town job they had worked together, where Vince had paid a Hooters waitress $50 for her outfit - - top and shorts - - and how she had gone right then and there to the bathroom and changed out of them for him. What he did with these togs he didn’t say and I didn’t ask. But he insisted on pulling up a photo of himself with her on his cell phone. Well, this whole thing was weird - - both Vince with the Hooters outfit and Starner wasting all that time shooting the bull about it. During this same interlude, Starner showed that he, too, was no stranger to sexual weirdness. He was talking to Vince about doing something that required him to get into a tight spot, and Starner said by way of encouragement, "I could get in there with my 275 pounds," or something to that effect. Then he added, "and 50 pounds of dick." This comment came out of the clear blue. There were no women present (who he might have imagined to be interested in this information), and I’m reasonably sure Starner isn’t gay. Or maybe it was a delayed response to the Hooters discussion. Fortunately, Joe came in late Saturday and Starner put him with Vince. He sent me back to my own job.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Not Well
This morning Starner didn’t come in to work at all. My mate, Elmore, didn’t come in either, nor did his son. Among the contractors, that is to say, temps, I've seen many good, skilled shipfitters. But for some reason or other, no matter how solid they seem, you can’t depend on them to show up every day. Maybe that’s why they don’t hold permanent jobs. Not that the permanent yard workers don’t have plenty of problems. They have them all - - alcoholism, broken marriages and the burdens of child support, sometimes to more than one ex-wife, and of course, serious health problems for themselves and their spouses. On the subject of health, I've known very few shipyard workers who take care of themselves. Bad diet, smoking, failure to use protective equipment at work - - all of it. They have diabetes, high blood pressure, heart conditions, breathing problems. I don’t know what the average age of shipyard workers is, but I’d guess it’s around 50. In any case, it’s an ageing workforce. It seems like every year somebody in our yard dies of heart attack.
A couple of weeks ago Kenny, a burner, was showing around a real estate agent’s flyer with a photo of a house up for sale. What’s this, I asked. He said it was the house of a worker on night shift - - a guy whose name I didn’t recognize, although I must have recognized him if I’d seen his face. This guy, Kenny said, had hung himself in that very house two years ago. Apparently he was despondent over his deteriorating health - - diabetes and other conditions. Kenny himself is about 50. He has long, unkempt hair and mustache, always seems to have gone several days without shaving, and looks like a very big sack of potatoes. He’s also a heavy smoker.
Many shipyard workers work all the overtime they can get to pay their bills - - sometimes necessary bills, sometimes frivolous spending - - $40,000 pickup trucks and the like. I know people who’d work 12 hours a day seven days a week if they could. They don’t seem to have any lives at all outside the yard. When they get older all they think about is retirement. But 6 months or a year after they retire many of them are dead. So what’s it all for?
A couple of weeks ago Kenny, a burner, was showing around a real estate agent’s flyer with a photo of a house up for sale. What’s this, I asked. He said it was the house of a worker on night shift - - a guy whose name I didn’t recognize, although I must have recognized him if I’d seen his face. This guy, Kenny said, had hung himself in that very house two years ago. Apparently he was despondent over his deteriorating health - - diabetes and other conditions. Kenny himself is about 50. He has long, unkempt hair and mustache, always seems to have gone several days without shaving, and looks like a very big sack of potatoes. He’s also a heavy smoker.
Many shipyard workers work all the overtime they can get to pay their bills - - sometimes necessary bills, sometimes frivolous spending - - $40,000 pickup trucks and the like. I know people who’d work 12 hours a day seven days a week if they could. They don’t seem to have any lives at all outside the yard. When they get older all they think about is retirement. But 6 months or a year after they retire many of them are dead. So what’s it all for?
Friday, February 20, 2009
"Progress" - - At A Tedious Pace
Thursday, February 19
Yesterday I was working on another aluminum bulkhead with a contractor named Elmore. Elmore is a tall, skinny black man with a hatchet face and a goatee. He has a 24-year-old son who is also working on our ship and is a dead-ringer for his father - - or at least a dead ringer for how his father must have looked 24 years ago - - right down to the goatee. Elmore Sr. is quiet and not articulate, but a good worker, a "self-starter," and a competent, knowledgeable fitter.
Well, we got in a couple of hours work before we came to a dead stop because we needed some tack welding. We had a welder assigned to us, but no firewatches, so the welder couldn’t even strike an arc. Some bean counter had cut the number of firewatches on our ship. They are short of aluminum welders, but because of the lack of firewatches two aluminum welders spent the entire day idle. Makes sense to cut costs like that, right? Should I have been surprised to see this kind of incompetence and disorganization? I see it nearly every day. Well, Elmore Sr. and I joked that today we would have the firewatches but no welder. We were wrong. They still hadn’t resolved the firewatch problem and one of the aluminum welders laid out, so we had neither.
We had just come up with a couple of things we could do without a welder, when Starner, who was late again this morning, came and threw a monkey wrench in our plans. He said that because we didn’t have a welder or firewatches he was going to put us on another job for the day - - a job helping Vince. Vince is working on another part of the aluminum job and he already has a helper. Starner said some things had to be finished on that part of the job for the 50 percent progress review, which is coming up in a few days. Just to refresh your memory, a couple of weeks ago he told us they’d already had the 50 percent review and we were over our quota of hours. Obviously, that was bullshit, at least the part about the 50 percent review having taken place.
There are two related motives for wanting to show certain progress for this review. Starner and the other supervisors are under pressure from their bosses to show progress, but in the end it’s about money. (Surprise!) For one thing, if the ship isn’t completed on schedule it means big fines for the company. But also, the government pays in installments based on the percentage of work completed. The problem here is that what Starner wants done can cause disruption of the production plan. That is to say, of Vince’s production plan.
Vince, or Vicente, is a Chicano from California, close to retirement age and hard of hearing. He is an affable, humorous guy, but he’s very plodding and methodical in his work and he is going to do things his way come hell or high water. He’s also a pack rat. He spent at least two weeks assembling materials and tools for the job before he began any work at all. He’s got I don’t know how many fish boxes containing every tool known to shipfitting and then some, as well as hoards of every kind of supply from earplugs and respirator cartridges to saw blades, grinding wheels, and extension cords. As I watched him marshal this war chest it reminded me of Gen. George McClellan during the Civil War, who built up a huge, well equipped army around Washington for a never-to-happen invasion of the South. (It was this that prompted Lincoln to make his famous quip, "If you’re not going to use this army, I’d like to borrow it for a week.")
Unlike McClellan, Vince did eventually get under way, but at his own pace - - a tedious pace - - and with the help of several assistants. But Starner’s attempt to dictate a faster and the order that Vince would do things resulted in almost nothing getting done today, either by Vince and his helper, who I call "Glitch," or by Elmore and myself, since we weren’t about to step in and take over Vince’s job.
Yesterday I was working on another aluminum bulkhead with a contractor named Elmore. Elmore is a tall, skinny black man with a hatchet face and a goatee. He has a 24-year-old son who is also working on our ship and is a dead-ringer for his father - - or at least a dead ringer for how his father must have looked 24 years ago - - right down to the goatee. Elmore Sr. is quiet and not articulate, but a good worker, a "self-starter," and a competent, knowledgeable fitter.
Well, we got in a couple of hours work before we came to a dead stop because we needed some tack welding. We had a welder assigned to us, but no firewatches, so the welder couldn’t even strike an arc. Some bean counter had cut the number of firewatches on our ship. They are short of aluminum welders, but because of the lack of firewatches two aluminum welders spent the entire day idle. Makes sense to cut costs like that, right? Should I have been surprised to see this kind of incompetence and disorganization? I see it nearly every day. Well, Elmore Sr. and I joked that today we would have the firewatches but no welder. We were wrong. They still hadn’t resolved the firewatch problem and one of the aluminum welders laid out, so we had neither.
We had just come up with a couple of things we could do without a welder, when Starner, who was late again this morning, came and threw a monkey wrench in our plans. He said that because we didn’t have a welder or firewatches he was going to put us on another job for the day - - a job helping Vince. Vince is working on another part of the aluminum job and he already has a helper. Starner said some things had to be finished on that part of the job for the 50 percent progress review, which is coming up in a few days. Just to refresh your memory, a couple of weeks ago he told us they’d already had the 50 percent review and we were over our quota of hours. Obviously, that was bullshit, at least the part about the 50 percent review having taken place.
There are two related motives for wanting to show certain progress for this review. Starner and the other supervisors are under pressure from their bosses to show progress, but in the end it’s about money. (Surprise!) For one thing, if the ship isn’t completed on schedule it means big fines for the company. But also, the government pays in installments based on the percentage of work completed. The problem here is that what Starner wants done can cause disruption of the production plan. That is to say, of Vince’s production plan.
Vince, or Vicente, is a Chicano from California, close to retirement age and hard of hearing. He is an affable, humorous guy, but he’s very plodding and methodical in his work and he is going to do things his way come hell or high water. He’s also a pack rat. He spent at least two weeks assembling materials and tools for the job before he began any work at all. He’s got I don’t know how many fish boxes containing every tool known to shipfitting and then some, as well as hoards of every kind of supply from earplugs and respirator cartridges to saw blades, grinding wheels, and extension cords. As I watched him marshal this war chest it reminded me of Gen. George McClellan during the Civil War, who built up a huge, well equipped army around Washington for a never-to-happen invasion of the South. (It was this that prompted Lincoln to make his famous quip, "If you’re not going to use this army, I’d like to borrow it for a week.")
Unlike McClellan, Vince did eventually get under way, but at his own pace - - a tedious pace - - and with the help of several assistants. But Starner’s attempt to dictate a faster and the order that Vince would do things resulted in almost nothing getting done today, either by Vince and his helper, who I call "Glitch," or by Elmore and myself, since we weren’t about to step in and take over Vince’s job.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Tit for Tat
Wednesday, February 18
After lecturing us on attendance Monday, Starner was late to work yesterday and today, no doubt because some of those problems were catching up with him. Anyway, for two days we have been deprived of his words of wisdom at our shape-up meetings. Amazingly, however, after three months, somebody has finally noticed the time being wasted at these meetings, because this morning Ronnie Wilson told us that from here on out we are going to be on our jobs within 15 minutes of the start of our shift. But he tried to blame the problem on the stragglers who don’t show up at the trailer until 5, or in the odd case 10, minutes after the start-of-work whistle. Of course he made no mention of the fact that usually most of us are there waiting for the supervisors to arrive, or of the time wasted on their unbelievably slow roll-call, or their rambling, pointless speeches, or their disorganization in dispatching us to our jobs, which in most cases we don’t need to be dispatched to anyway, because we are continuing with the same job we had the day before.
Yesterday, while we were standing around waiting for the shape-up meeting to start, I "got into it" with Sanjay. Sanjay, a contractor, is an East Indian who comes not from India but from one of the Pacific islands. He is also a born-again Christian and a self-styled preacher, of which we have many in the shipyard. Normally, I am tolerant of these Jesus people -- that is, so long as they leave me alone. But Sanjay is self-righteous and annoying, so I was baiting him. "Hey," I said, "What's the 'H' stand for in Jesus' name?" "What? There is no 'H'" Sanjay replied. "Sure there is," I said. "Jesus H. Christ?" Sanjay was apoplectic. Lana, of course, jumped in to bail him out. "It stands for 'Hosannah'" she said. "'Heaven,'" another quick-witted Christian offered. Lana is a black woman, short and stout, probably somewhere in her 50s. She is another of the Jesus people. Nominally, Lana is a burner.
Burning is support craft. Burners aid the shipfitters by cutting steel with gas/oxygen torches -- scrapping out old steel that is to be replaced and trimming new steel to fit. Lana came into the shipyard 30 or more years ago, when the feminist movement was opening up industrial jobs to women and companies with government contracts were under pressure to add women to their workforces. But Lana is no feminist. Far from it. She is content to do any work they give her that is not burning. At the moment, they are keeping her in the office trailer doing paperwork. This she is good at. She is also intelligent and articulate. But she doesn’t have a good reputation as a burner. (In my opinion that’s because she does so little of it.) There’s no shortage of supervisors who’ll give her other work either because they don’t trust her to burn or because, especially in the case of the black supervisors, they regard her as a mother figure in need of protection.
Lana has been assigned to work with me a couple of times on past jobs. The last time I tried to get her to do the work believing that she was competent, or would be competent if only she would get some practice at her trade. But my efforts were frustrated by another -- male -- burner who was hanging out on our job and insisted on burning for her. Not only didn’t Lana object to this, she told me it was a woman’s place to defer to a man. Lana can be annoying for other reasons. She’s always good-humored, even "chipper," which is sometimes hard to take, especially first thing in the morning when you really don’t feel like being there. And then she’s obsessed with cleaning. Now we are supposed to clean up our work areas at the end of the day, because the Navy demands it. I comply with this. But Lana is always cleaning, not only the debris that we make, but everything else as well. The other job I remember her working for me, before she would cut anything for me I had wait for her to finish cleaning whatever it was she had taken a notion to clean. Very hard to take.
So, yesterday at lunchtime, Lana tried to pay me back for giving her pal Sanjay a hard time. She invited me to their lunchtime bible study meeting. Sure, I said, I’ll be right there. Then I plunked down in my usual spot, an unused corner of the office trailer, opened my lunch pail and got out the book I’m reading.
After lecturing us on attendance Monday, Starner was late to work yesterday and today, no doubt because some of those problems were catching up with him. Anyway, for two days we have been deprived of his words of wisdom at our shape-up meetings. Amazingly, however, after three months, somebody has finally noticed the time being wasted at these meetings, because this morning Ronnie Wilson told us that from here on out we are going to be on our jobs within 15 minutes of the start of our shift. But he tried to blame the problem on the stragglers who don’t show up at the trailer until 5, or in the odd case 10, minutes after the start-of-work whistle. Of course he made no mention of the fact that usually most of us are there waiting for the supervisors to arrive, or of the time wasted on their unbelievably slow roll-call, or their rambling, pointless speeches, or their disorganization in dispatching us to our jobs, which in most cases we don’t need to be dispatched to anyway, because we are continuing with the same job we had the day before.
Yesterday, while we were standing around waiting for the shape-up meeting to start, I "got into it" with Sanjay. Sanjay, a contractor, is an East Indian who comes not from India but from one of the Pacific islands. He is also a born-again Christian and a self-styled preacher, of which we have many in the shipyard. Normally, I am tolerant of these Jesus people -- that is, so long as they leave me alone. But Sanjay is self-righteous and annoying, so I was baiting him. "Hey," I said, "What's the 'H' stand for in Jesus' name?" "What? There is no 'H'" Sanjay replied. "Sure there is," I said. "Jesus H. Christ?" Sanjay was apoplectic. Lana, of course, jumped in to bail him out. "It stands for 'Hosannah'" she said. "'Heaven,'" another quick-witted Christian offered. Lana is a black woman, short and stout, probably somewhere in her 50s. She is another of the Jesus people. Nominally, Lana is a burner.
Burning is support craft. Burners aid the shipfitters by cutting steel with gas/oxygen torches -- scrapping out old steel that is to be replaced and trimming new steel to fit. Lana came into the shipyard 30 or more years ago, when the feminist movement was opening up industrial jobs to women and companies with government contracts were under pressure to add women to their workforces. But Lana is no feminist. Far from it. She is content to do any work they give her that is not burning. At the moment, they are keeping her in the office trailer doing paperwork. This she is good at. She is also intelligent and articulate. But she doesn’t have a good reputation as a burner. (In my opinion that’s because she does so little of it.) There’s no shortage of supervisors who’ll give her other work either because they don’t trust her to burn or because, especially in the case of the black supervisors, they regard her as a mother figure in need of protection.
Lana has been assigned to work with me a couple of times on past jobs. The last time I tried to get her to do the work believing that she was competent, or would be competent if only she would get some practice at her trade. But my efforts were frustrated by another -- male -- burner who was hanging out on our job and insisted on burning for her. Not only didn’t Lana object to this, she told me it was a woman’s place to defer to a man. Lana can be annoying for other reasons. She’s always good-humored, even "chipper," which is sometimes hard to take, especially first thing in the morning when you really don’t feel like being there. And then she’s obsessed with cleaning. Now we are supposed to clean up our work areas at the end of the day, because the Navy demands it. I comply with this. But Lana is always cleaning, not only the debris that we make, but everything else as well. The other job I remember her working for me, before she would cut anything for me I had wait for her to finish cleaning whatever it was she had taken a notion to clean. Very hard to take.
So, yesterday at lunchtime, Lana tried to pay me back for giving her pal Sanjay a hard time. She invited me to their lunchtime bible study meeting. Sure, I said, I’ll be right there. Then I plunked down in my usual spot, an unused corner of the office trailer, opened my lunch pail and got out the book I’m reading.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Double Talk
This morning at our shape-up meeting Starner exhorted us to come to work every day. “I got more problems than any of you,” he said. “But I’m here at work every day.” I turned to Summerfield, who was standing beside me. “I’d like to know what work he does,” I said. “Chasing pussy,” he replied. Summerfield, a redneck with snaggle teeth and long gray hair, is about 6’3” tall and 240 lbs. He’s got a waterfront home on which he’s struggling to make $1700 a month mortgage payments, so he doesn’t need a pep talk about coming to work. He also told me he’s got a gun collection including, I think, 39 hand guns and three AK-47s.
Later in the day Summerfield asked if he could borrow my firewatch. I said yes, because Joe and I didn’t have a welder and couldn’t do any hotwork. He said Starner had assigned him to cut some steel pads off the deck of a fan room with an angle grinder. But the firewatch coordinator had no firewatches to assign him, so Starner told him, “You’re your own firewatch today.” Starner, who always says “Safety first” (the official company line), knows very well that not only isn’t Summerfield qualified to firewatch, but firewatching for oneself is both against company policy and a violation of government rules. Luckily Summerfield wasn’t dumb enough to fall for that one, because if he’d been caught Starner would have denied telling him to do it.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Wasted Hours
Tuesday, February 10.
Starner, my supervisor, has a large mouth shaped like an upside down crescent, so that he is permanently scowling. He looks like a bulldog with a bad case of indigestion. For some reason he’s the one who talks most at our morning shape-up meetings, even though he’s not at all articulate and talks in a bark or growl. The thing of it is, he never has anything to say beyond repeating platitudes about safety and production and threatening us over various alleged infractions. He talks like a prison guard. But he always ends his rant by telling us to have a “nice and blessed day.” This has become something of a joke, with some of the workers saying the words for him. I will say this for him, at least he has enough sense of humor that he tries to grin at this.
Anyhow, this morning he told me to go to the drydock and work for Ronnie Wilson. They’re getting the ship ready to come out of drydock and we would be working on the shrouds that cover the propeller shafts, which have been removed from the ship for rework. But before I tell you about that I need to explain what I did yesterday.
You’ll recall that I was working with Joe. That was up topside doing some structural modifications to the aluminum superstructure. We’d been waiting for a new bulkhead to be fabricated and hoisted by crane onto the ship. It finally arrived over the weekend and the riggers brought it into the space. But we had to get it in place so we could trim it to fit. Normally, hanging it in place would be the job of the riggers. We also needed a welder to get ready for the riggers. The bosses were in a big rush to get this bulkhead fitted up so they could show some progress on the superstructure work. But they were incapable of getting us the welder or the riggers we needed. So, apart from a little preparatory work, we had done hardly anything until after lunch, when another guy, Kenny, happened by. Kenny had nothing to do at the time, so he and Joe got the idea to “manhandle” the bulkhead into place rather than waiting for the riggers to do it with their chain hoists.
Now the bulkhead measured about 7 ½ by 9 ½ feet and had tee-bar stiffeners attached. Even though it was aluminum it was pretty heavy to move by hand, especially since we had a number of obstructions to get over or around. I was against our trying to move it because of the danger to ourselves and to some electrical cables that were in the way. If someone got hurt or a cable was damaged they’d blame us moving the bulkhead without the riggers. But Joe and Kenny were determined, so I did what I could to help, more or less directing them, but lending a hand when necessary. I improvised a lever to raise it over one stubborn obstacle. So we managed to get it into position despite my misgivings, and I came up with a way to raise it the 4 inches or so that we needed it to be off the deck so we could trim it. Then we found that the layout department, which had been in charge of fabricating the bulkhead and had sent their people at least three times to measure for it, had made it rectangular, when the hole wasn’t a true rectangle. And they hadn’t left enough added material to cover their screw up. This would have left an unacceptable gap in one corner. We were talking about what to do when I realized that if we rotated the bulkhead slightly on its horizontal axis and trimmed out a pie shaped sliver from the top, we could make it work. I marked out the cut and we lowered the plate. Joe made the cut with a reciprocating saw. That was as far as we got at the end of the day. We were just getting started fitting the bulkhead, and up to that point my help had been critical in getting the job right.
So this morning they took me off that job, leaving it to Joe, and as it turned out, Kenny, while they put me down in the drydock with a helper. It took Ronnie Wilson a full hour to come and to show us what he wanted. Then it turned out that the machinists and riggers were still getting the shaft back into place and weren’t even ready for us. So for the most part we stood around and did nothing. Sounds pretty dumb, huh? It only makes sense if you understand shipyard logic. The big shots were on our department to get the drydock work finished, so Ronnie Wilson charged our time to drydock work, even though they it was just wasted hours, so he, and our department, could be seen to be doing what they were told. In order to be in a “supervisory” position you have to be a yes man who doesn’t ask questions or make objections.
Wednesday, February 11.
Today they put me back on the aluminum job with Joe. Yesterday while I was in the drydock Joe and Kenny had finished fitting up the bulkhead. They had had to cut some more of the piece of pie we had cut out the day before, but the fit-up looked good. There was to be a check point at 10:30 where QA and the government inspector would come to inspect the fit-up and weld joint design before the bulkhead could be welded in place. But there had been another screw-up. We found out that we hadn’t been given the right blueprints – apparently there was a later version that none of the many supervisors had bothered to tell us about. So we had to partly remove the bulkhead again to fix problems with the joint design. The check point finally came off in the afternoon. But because they had to verify the joint design, we had to leave part of the bulkhead loose; that is, not tack-welded in place, and for that reason the government inspector would only sign off on the joint design and not the fit-up.
Starner, my supervisor, has a large mouth shaped like an upside down crescent, so that he is permanently scowling. He looks like a bulldog with a bad case of indigestion. For some reason he’s the one who talks most at our morning shape-up meetings, even though he’s not at all articulate and talks in a bark or growl. The thing of it is, he never has anything to say beyond repeating platitudes about safety and production and threatening us over various alleged infractions. He talks like a prison guard. But he always ends his rant by telling us to have a “nice and blessed day.” This has become something of a joke, with some of the workers saying the words for him. I will say this for him, at least he has enough sense of humor that he tries to grin at this.
Anyhow, this morning he told me to go to the drydock and work for Ronnie Wilson. They’re getting the ship ready to come out of drydock and we would be working on the shrouds that cover the propeller shafts, which have been removed from the ship for rework. But before I tell you about that I need to explain what I did yesterday.
You’ll recall that I was working with Joe. That was up topside doing some structural modifications to the aluminum superstructure. We’d been waiting for a new bulkhead to be fabricated and hoisted by crane onto the ship. It finally arrived over the weekend and the riggers brought it into the space. But we had to get it in place so we could trim it to fit. Normally, hanging it in place would be the job of the riggers. We also needed a welder to get ready for the riggers. The bosses were in a big rush to get this bulkhead fitted up so they could show some progress on the superstructure work. But they were incapable of getting us the welder or the riggers we needed. So, apart from a little preparatory work, we had done hardly anything until after lunch, when another guy, Kenny, happened by. Kenny had nothing to do at the time, so he and Joe got the idea to “manhandle” the bulkhead into place rather than waiting for the riggers to do it with their chain hoists.
Now the bulkhead measured about 7 ½ by 9 ½ feet and had tee-bar stiffeners attached. Even though it was aluminum it was pretty heavy to move by hand, especially since we had a number of obstructions to get over or around. I was against our trying to move it because of the danger to ourselves and to some electrical cables that were in the way. If someone got hurt or a cable was damaged they’d blame us moving the bulkhead without the riggers. But Joe and Kenny were determined, so I did what I could to help, more or less directing them, but lending a hand when necessary. I improvised a lever to raise it over one stubborn obstacle. So we managed to get it into position despite my misgivings, and I came up with a way to raise it the 4 inches or so that we needed it to be off the deck so we could trim it. Then we found that the layout department, which had been in charge of fabricating the bulkhead and had sent their people at least three times to measure for it, had made it rectangular, when the hole wasn’t a true rectangle. And they hadn’t left enough added material to cover their screw up. This would have left an unacceptable gap in one corner. We were talking about what to do when I realized that if we rotated the bulkhead slightly on its horizontal axis and trimmed out a pie shaped sliver from the top, we could make it work. I marked out the cut and we lowered the plate. Joe made the cut with a reciprocating saw. That was as far as we got at the end of the day. We were just getting started fitting the bulkhead, and up to that point my help had been critical in getting the job right.
So this morning they took me off that job, leaving it to Joe, and as it turned out, Kenny, while they put me down in the drydock with a helper. It took Ronnie Wilson a full hour to come and to show us what he wanted. Then it turned out that the machinists and riggers were still getting the shaft back into place and weren’t even ready for us. So for the most part we stood around and did nothing. Sounds pretty dumb, huh? It only makes sense if you understand shipyard logic. The big shots were on our department to get the drydock work finished, so Ronnie Wilson charged our time to drydock work, even though they it was just wasted hours, so he, and our department, could be seen to be doing what they were told. In order to be in a “supervisory” position you have to be a yes man who doesn’t ask questions or make objections.
Wednesday, February 11.
Today they put me back on the aluminum job with Joe. Yesterday while I was in the drydock Joe and Kenny had finished fitting up the bulkhead. They had had to cut some more of the piece of pie we had cut out the day before, but the fit-up looked good. There was to be a check point at 10:30 where QA and the government inspector would come to inspect the fit-up and weld joint design before the bulkhead could be welded in place. But there had been another screw-up. We found out that we hadn’t been given the right blueprints – apparently there was a later version that none of the many supervisors had bothered to tell us about. So we had to partly remove the bulkhead again to fix problems with the joint design. The check point finally came off in the afternoon. But because they had to verify the joint design, we had to leave part of the bulkhead loose; that is, not tack-welded in place, and for that reason the government inspector would only sign off on the joint design and not the fit-up.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
A False Step
Monday, 02-09-2009
Today was another example, although a minor one, of how my survival skills aren’t the best. It’s a comment I made to Joe. But first let me tell you about Joe. I’ve been working with him, off and on, for the last couple of weeks.
Joe is a big guy. I don’t mean “big” as a euphemism for fat or obese. Joe is about 6’ tall, 210 lbs., affable, always smiling, always kidding around. But he’s nervous when he has nothing to do. Can’t stand still. So even though he jokes around about doing as little as possible, he’ll make work for himself. He also happens to be one of those guys, common in the shipyard, who don’t drive a car because their license is suspended for D.U.I. But the bosses consider him one of the go-getters. I’d say he’s average as a shipfitter in terms of ability. He’s neither precise nor careful. During the time I’ve been working with him I’ve caught him in several mistakes. He will also work unsafe frequently, like today, when he was working straddling a stepladder – one foot on a step, the other on a cross brace. And he sometimes uses an angle grinder without wearing a face shield. That kind of thing. Not really serious, but enough to get him written up if a safety inspector saw him. I didn’t like Joe at first, in part because of his tendency to kiss up to the supervisors, but now I’ve come to like him. We complement each other, sort of. I let him be the go-getter, because I have a Bad Attitude. Meanwhile, I keep my eye on him and make corrections when necessary. Oddly enough, though, it’s often me who makes a suggestion that moves things along while he’s just spinning his wheels.
So, for what I said. In the morning our nominal supervisor, Starner, seemed to be camping out on our job. He just stood there, saying nothing. It gave me the heebee jeebies. I kept waiting for him to leave, but he didn’t. After a while, right outside the space, I said to Joe, “Is he going to hang out here all day?” Later, Joe told me Starner said to him, “He knows I heard him, doesn’t he?” And I thought, “Uh oh, I screwed up.” I didn’t think he could hear me. But then, as I thought it over, I remembered having this split-second flash as I said it, that was like, maybe he can hear me, but I don’t care. Well, it wasn’t really a big deal anyway. Joe said, “He did get off our job.” But somebody else suggested the real reason Starner left. There were no women there for him to hit on. The week before he’d hung out for a couple of days on Joe’s job, first trying to hit on a woman electrician, then on the firewatch.
Today was another example, although a minor one, of how my survival skills aren’t the best. It’s a comment I made to Joe. But first let me tell you about Joe. I’ve been working with him, off and on, for the last couple of weeks.
Joe is a big guy. I don’t mean “big” as a euphemism for fat or obese. Joe is about 6’ tall, 210 lbs., affable, always smiling, always kidding around. But he’s nervous when he has nothing to do. Can’t stand still. So even though he jokes around about doing as little as possible, he’ll make work for himself. He also happens to be one of those guys, common in the shipyard, who don’t drive a car because their license is suspended for D.U.I. But the bosses consider him one of the go-getters. I’d say he’s average as a shipfitter in terms of ability. He’s neither precise nor careful. During the time I’ve been working with him I’ve caught him in several mistakes. He will also work unsafe frequently, like today, when he was working straddling a stepladder – one foot on a step, the other on a cross brace. And he sometimes uses an angle grinder without wearing a face shield. That kind of thing. Not really serious, but enough to get him written up if a safety inspector saw him. I didn’t like Joe at first, in part because of his tendency to kiss up to the supervisors, but now I’ve come to like him. We complement each other, sort of. I let him be the go-getter, because I have a Bad Attitude. Meanwhile, I keep my eye on him and make corrections when necessary. Oddly enough, though, it’s often me who makes a suggestion that moves things along while he’s just spinning his wheels.
So, for what I said. In the morning our nominal supervisor, Starner, seemed to be camping out on our job. He just stood there, saying nothing. It gave me the heebee jeebies. I kept waiting for him to leave, but he didn’t. After a while, right outside the space, I said to Joe, “Is he going to hang out here all day?” Later, Joe told me Starner said to him, “He knows I heard him, doesn’t he?” And I thought, “Uh oh, I screwed up.” I didn’t think he could hear me. But then, as I thought it over, I remembered having this split-second flash as I said it, that was like, maybe he can hear me, but I don’t care. Well, it wasn’t really a big deal anyway. Joe said, “He did get off our job.” But somebody else suggested the real reason Starner left. There were no women there for him to hit on. The week before he’d hung out for a couple of days on Joe’s job, first trying to hit on a woman electrician, then on the firewatch.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Headache Volunteer List
Last Saturday I had a good job, so it figures that yesterday I would have a bad job. Yes, I signed up to work on Saturday again. Even though I’m not really hurting for money, I am paying out of pocket for materials to complete an extreme makeover of my house, and I can use more of a cushion than I have, especially in these uncertain times.
Although the job I had yesterday wouldn’t win the academy award for worst job in the shipyard, it might easily be a nominee. They sent me to another ship for the day, down in a ballast tank with half a dozen contractors (temps), needle-gunning paint. The ship must have run aground or hit something because the bottom shell was dented in and a number of the web frames – the ribs of the ship – crumpled. Our yard will scrap out and replace the damaged steel.
For safety reasons having to do with the danger of fire and fumes, the paint around the affected areas must be removed before the steel can be cut out with burning torches. To do this we use needle guns. These are compressed-air-powered tools weighing about 10 pounds, the business end of which consists of about 30 steel “needles” about 3/32” in diameter. When you press the trigger these needles vibrate and pulverize the paint. They are extremely loud, even with earplugs worn, especially when you’re in a tank echoing with 6 or 7 needle guns going at once. And the vibration is enough to shake the fillings of your teeth loose. Actually, few of the needle guns were going at the same time because there was no supervision in the tank. In fact, when the supervisor assigned me to the job, he didn’t even show it to me himself, but told one of the contractors who’d been working the job to show me where it was. No one had even marked up the paint that had to come off. Still, I found a place that I knew had to be needle-gunned..
My productivity goes way down when they give me a job that isn’t commensurate with my experience and skill level. In my opinion, for what it’s worth, assigning work appropriately is one of the criteria for a good supervisor, and placing people in the jobs they can do best is a precondition for efficient production. Needle-gunning is some of the least skilled work we have. That isn’t to say that all of us don’t have to hew wood and draw water once in a while. If a house is burning down no one should be exempt from passing a bucket unless they’re the only one who knows how to get the pump working. Of course if I said this stuff to management they’d go berserk and howl about how we have to be ready to do whatever job they assign us, etc. etc. But that’s just laziness on their part.
As it happened, I doubt I did 2 hours actual needle gunning during my 8 hour shift. Add to that an hour or so to check out a needle gun from the tool room and get set up. But get this: even though there is temporary lighting in the tanks, we’re required for safety sake to carry a flashlight in case the power goes out – which happens for one reason or another more often than you might think. Well, in the morning the cheap storeroom issue flashlight crapped out. So after lunch I went to get some new batteries, for which I needed a supervisor to write me an order. (You’d think that when they have a lot of people working in tanks they’d plan ahead and have batteries on hand, but they don’t.) I found one supervisor but he didn’t have any stores order blanks with him so he told me to go back to the supervisors’ office in the structural shop and find the other supervisor. Well, I had just come from there and wasn’t about to make the trek back again. Luckily I found a welder supervisor who had a blank. I filled it out myself and took it back to the first supervisor to sign. But then it turned out that the storeroom trailer by the drydock was closed, so I had to go all the way to the main storeroom, which is even farther than the structural shop. There, there was only one guy behind the counter and by the time I got back to the ship with a working flashlight nearly two hours had elapsed. But I don’t think any of the contractors did any more needle-gunning than I did. Still, I did enough needle-gunning to give me a headache. Don’t think I’ll sign the overtime volunteer list next week.
Although the job I had yesterday wouldn’t win the academy award for worst job in the shipyard, it might easily be a nominee. They sent me to another ship for the day, down in a ballast tank with half a dozen contractors (temps), needle-gunning paint. The ship must have run aground or hit something because the bottom shell was dented in and a number of the web frames – the ribs of the ship – crumpled. Our yard will scrap out and replace the damaged steel.
For safety reasons having to do with the danger of fire and fumes, the paint around the affected areas must be removed before the steel can be cut out with burning torches. To do this we use needle guns. These are compressed-air-powered tools weighing about 10 pounds, the business end of which consists of about 30 steel “needles” about 3/32” in diameter. When you press the trigger these needles vibrate and pulverize the paint. They are extremely loud, even with earplugs worn, especially when you’re in a tank echoing with 6 or 7 needle guns going at once. And the vibration is enough to shake the fillings of your teeth loose. Actually, few of the needle guns were going at the same time because there was no supervision in the tank. In fact, when the supervisor assigned me to the job, he didn’t even show it to me himself, but told one of the contractors who’d been working the job to show me where it was. No one had even marked up the paint that had to come off. Still, I found a place that I knew had to be needle-gunned..
My productivity goes way down when they give me a job that isn’t commensurate with my experience and skill level. In my opinion, for what it’s worth, assigning work appropriately is one of the criteria for a good supervisor, and placing people in the jobs they can do best is a precondition for efficient production. Needle-gunning is some of the least skilled work we have. That isn’t to say that all of us don’t have to hew wood and draw water once in a while. If a house is burning down no one should be exempt from passing a bucket unless they’re the only one who knows how to get the pump working. Of course if I said this stuff to management they’d go berserk and howl about how we have to be ready to do whatever job they assign us, etc. etc. But that’s just laziness on their part.
As it happened, I doubt I did 2 hours actual needle gunning during my 8 hour shift. Add to that an hour or so to check out a needle gun from the tool room and get set up. But get this: even though there is temporary lighting in the tanks, we’re required for safety sake to carry a flashlight in case the power goes out – which happens for one reason or another more often than you might think. Well, in the morning the cheap storeroom issue flashlight crapped out. So after lunch I went to get some new batteries, for which I needed a supervisor to write me an order. (You’d think that when they have a lot of people working in tanks they’d plan ahead and have batteries on hand, but they don’t.) I found one supervisor but he didn’t have any stores order blanks with him so he told me to go back to the supervisors’ office in the structural shop and find the other supervisor. Well, I had just come from there and wasn’t about to make the trek back again. Luckily I found a welder supervisor who had a blank. I filled it out myself and took it back to the first supervisor to sign. But then it turned out that the storeroom trailer by the drydock was closed, so I had to go all the way to the main storeroom, which is even farther than the structural shop. There, there was only one guy behind the counter and by the time I got back to the ship with a working flashlight nearly two hours had elapsed. But I don’t think any of the contractors did any more needle-gunning than I did. Still, I did enough needle-gunning to give me a headache. Don’t think I’ll sign the overtime volunteer list next week.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Lead Man From Another Planet
The most curious of the supervisors on my job right now, in terms of my relationship to him, is Hilton Dines. Hilton is a slim black man who makes me think of Barack Obama on speed. He is light-skinned, with green eyes and Caucasian features and he speaks in a refined and educated manner, although his bursts of machine-gun fire speech are staccato and telegraphic. He clearly doesn’t look or sound like he comes from the ‘hood. I don’t know what his background is, but I’ll bet it’s a military family. Under his hardhat he almost always wears a sweatshirt with the hood up. You also often see him wearing a cartridge-type respirator even when he’s out in the open air. When he takes this gear off, however, you see that his shaved head is strangely shaped. He might be the brother from another planet.
During the 5 years I was a QA inspector, I knocked heads with Hilton several times. Once, they had to call a special meeting with him and me and some of the brass from the QA and structural departments just to try to mediate between us. Given this past history, it should be no surprise that the first time I was assigned to work under Hilton after I came back to the structural department I thought maybe he might take the occasion to settle an old score with me. Much to my surprise, however, he was friendly and treated me with respect. I respect him as well, and not just because he respects me, although that’s a big part of it. Even though he’s much too hyper, he at least spends a lot of time on the ship, where a shipyard supervisor should be, and he’s conscientious and not corrupt. I don’t mean corrupt in the sense of taking bribes or anything like that. I mean that he doesn’t use his position to create an easy niche for himself or to manipulate overtime to maximize his own income as many of them do. And even though he’s on the ship a lot, he leaves you pretty much alone and when he talks to you it’s like the two of you are intelligent collaborators. He doesn’t come and tell you a lot of stupid shit you already know.
I hadn’t worked any overtime in a couple of weeks, so last Saturday I volunteered to come in, and because my own job wasn’t working, I worked for Hilton for the day. It was probably the best day I’ve had since I came on this ship. We have removed the king posts -- retractable masts used to support cables that hauled supplies to the ship during replenishment at sea. (Supplies will now be delivered by helicopter.) What I was doing on Saturday was filling in one level of deck in what used to be the trunk that housed the forward king post. Even though this section of deck was small, about 5 feet by 5 feet, we were putting it in in three sections of plate, in part because the deck changed thickness here from 7/16 inch to ¼ inch, but also because it wasn’t an even plane here, but had a knuckle offset of about 10 degrees. This meant that the T-bar stiffener that supported it underneath also had to have a knuckle. Now 19 out of 20 shipfitters would have done the obvious and usual procedure, which would be to fit the plate sections in the deck, then piece in the T-bar underneath. But if they had done that they would have found themselves in trouble, and likely ended up with a mess, because when I trimmed the center plate section to size and fit it temporarily in place, I saw that it had a bow in it. Unless they straightened it first with a temporary stiffener on top, they would not have been able to correctly fit in the sections of T-bar underneath. And this process would have been very time consuming. I chose instead to first make up the T-bar with the proper knuckle in it and fit that up first. It would then be easy to fit the plate sections on top of it. Because of the location and various obstructions, it wasn’t easy to pick up the correct angle from the existing deck, but I came up with a simple solution using a piece of scrap steel angle I found lying around. My burner and I made up the T-bar and tack welded it together. I checked it and the knuckle seemed perfect or close to it. It needed 1/4 inch trimmed off to fit, however, and we had run out of time. Hilton wanted night shift to finish the job, so I marked off where it needed to be trimmed. I was afraid, however, that night shift wouldn’t understand what I was doing and would screw it up. But when I came in and checked it on Monday, they had the whole thing together right and it looked great. Did anybody notice or care? I did, and that’s all that matters to me. Hilton was happy with the job, although I don’t think he fully appreciated the genius involved in my work (ha!).
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
The Bad Boy and the Backstabbers
So, for my deficient survival skills. The reason I’m working on the ship I’m on now is that I got kicked off the last ship I was on.
The supervisor there, Dean, used to be a friend of mine, long ago, before he became a supervisor. Until the incident I’m about to describe, I still considered him a friend, although in the years he’s been a supervisor he’s become so “ate up” with the job that he’s not interested in anything else. This particular job was one that we were working at another shipyard nearby. The company I work for wasn’t the prime contractor on that one, but a sub. Anyhow, this ship was a rather old Navy amphibious ship.
Dean, after bouncing me around on several different jobs, all of them partly or completely screwed up by people who had worked on them before I got there, assigned me a work item that involved setting foundations in the overhead for new cooling units. These units are large - - roughly 5 feet long by 3.5 feet wide by 16 inches high and weigh several hundred pounds. There were four of them, all to be located in very cramped control rooms, the largest of which was about 10 feet by 15 feet. All these spaces were filled with various types of equipment and had several trades and different contractors working in them at the same time.
The units were to be bolted to the foundations which were made of steel angle welded to the deck above. For some reason our fabrication shop had made them all 2 inches too wide and in such a way that it was impossible to drill all the mounting holes in the right places. Okay, my helper and I solved that problem by drilling new holes in the mounting flanges of the units themselves and then transferring this new hole pattern to the foundation. Annoying, but no big deal. Then, it happened that in one of the control rooms the Navy’s plans called for mounting the unit in a location so close to an adjacent bulkhead that when it was raised into place it was almost impossible to get the bolts in. But my helper on this one, “Sancho Panza,” and I managed to do it somehow. I have long arms, but because of all the equipment, piping, electrical cables, etc. in the way, I had to stretch up at a very awkward angle while standing precariously on a ladder that wasn’t under me because of equipment in the way. Plus I had to get both arms up behind the unit, one to reach up over to hold the nut, while I turned the socket wrench with a long extension the other. The unit, meanwhile, teetered on a table jack that the riggers couldn’t center under the unit properly, again because of the equipment in the way, equipment that couldn’t be moved. All in all, not a safe situation. Nevertheless, we made it happen, as they say. But when I got down from the ladder I couldn’t straighten up for quite a while. I had pulled a muscle in my back. It was the end of the shift and I wasn’t going to go back to our yard to report to first aid, knowing there was nothing they could do beside waste my time sending me somewhere for x-rays and ultimately giving me some pain killers. Anyhow, I wasn’t in a lot of pain and my back was better the next day. Okay, I know, I’m sounding like a whiner. But I have to give this background.
A couple of weeks went by. Then some inspector discovered that whoever had put up that foundation had failed to cut off some pieces of an old foundation they were supposed to rip out. It didn’t make any difference, because the cooling unit covered it up, but the prime contractor insisted the unit had to come down again and the old foundation removed. Dean, who had never checked behind the guys that screwed up here -- he wasn’t checking behind anybody -- ordered me to do it. (Dean, in fact, almost never came on the ship at all. He just went to meetings and did paperwork in the office trailer.) By this time I had lost what remaining respect I’d had for this ex-friend. Actually, he didn’t order me directly, he did it through Myron, his go-fer. Myron had just made supervisor a month after graduating from apprentice school. Now, apparently, he was an apprentice supervisor, because he didn’t do any supervising. He didn’t do anything except run errands for Dean.
Anyhow, it was Myron, delivering the message from Dean, who told me to take the cooling unit down again. After all the grief getting it up, I was pissed. I told him the back of the unit was impossible to get at, that I’d messed up my back putting it in place, and that I wasn’t going to risk messing it up again. This, after all, was a company that constantly harangues us about safety and made us all sign a pledge not to do anything unsafe. Myron didn’t know what to say. He hemmed and hawed, then said he’d talk to the superintendent in charge and see if there was some other way of solving the problem. That was in the morning. Then, as I was on my way to lunch, Myron stopped me and told me that the riggers would be in the control room right after lunch to take the unit down. “Okay,” I said. That was all. I knew what he meant, because in our company we, the shipfitters, are the ones who have to unbolt stuff. Then the riggers remove it. But he didn’t tell me to be there, and I’m not getting paid to read minds. After lunch I didn’t go to that space, except to pass through and get something I’d left there (the riggers hadn’t arrived yet). Instead I went to another location that Myron had told me to take care of. About 2 or 3 o’clock in the afternoon I came off the ship and there was Myron. He asked me where I’d been and claimed they’d been looking for me all afternoon. Then he lied and said he’d told me to be in the control room to unbolt the cooling unit for the riggers. He ordered me to pack up my tools and go back to our yard and report to the foreman. I said I was going to talk to Dean, which made him furious. Dean wasn’t around, however. When I finally got hold of him on his cell phone he said he was in a meeting but when he was done he would meet me in the control room to look at the situation of the cooling unit. But he never showed up. By then it was the end of the shift. Next morning at the start of the shift I did report to the foreman. I explained about the cooling unit, but he claimed to know nothing about this whole business. He phoned Dean, who denied that sending me back to the yard had anything to do with anything except that he was cutting back on manpower and didn’t need me any longer. That was total bullshit. Kicking me off the job was about Myron’s ego and power and Dean just decided to bail on the whole issue. Later, I learned from one of the other supervisors that the buzz in the supervisors’ office at the yard was that I had trouble taking orders from young black men. It had to be “young” because at least half the supervisors are black and I’ve never been accused of having trouble taking orders from any of the others. More on this later.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Asleep at the Wheel
Today at the shape-up meeting at the start of our shift, Starner, my supervisor, told the crew that we were “in the red” for hours expended on our job. They had just held the 50 percent progress review, we were nowhere near finished, but we had already used up all the hours allotted to the job. Now every week they have progress meetings where they go over the job item by item. The progress in work completion is supposed to match or better the calendar. That is to say, when we have used up, say, 10 percent of the days allotted for the job in the contract they are supposed to be able to report the work as 10 percent completed. Likewise, each supervisor makes out time sheets each day showing the number of man hours spent by each worker on each work item worked that day. They also have printouts showing the hours budgeted overall to each work item. So how is it possible that they suddenly discover at the halfway point that we are “out of hours?”
Even more astounding, Starner blamed it on us for “messin’ off.” “Now we got no hours, there ain’t no messin’ off,” he declared. Those were his exact words. “You gonna have everybody and their momma walkin’ the ship,” he said. Then Ronnie Wilson, who is over Starner had his say. “You can’t come here every day and expect to steal money from the man,” he told us. “You’re putting his job on the line,” he said, referring to Starner. “You’re putting my job on the line.”
Now how can it be that these supervisors have just now discovered that we’ve been “messing off” and stealing the man’s money for over two months without their knowing it? Either this whole thing about being out of hours is bullshit (the general opinion) or they have been asleep at the wheel. Or both. I vote for both. But I do know where a lot of lost hours have gone. On Friday we all spent the last two hours of the day pulling back lines – extension cords, air hoses, and welding lines – this was to impress somebody – and then we had to run them again this morning in order to do any work. And then there’s all the hours wasted on these bullshit meetings.
Even more astounding, Starner blamed it on us for “messin’ off.” “Now we got no hours, there ain’t no messin’ off,” he declared. Those were his exact words. “You gonna have everybody and their momma walkin’ the ship,” he said. Then Ronnie Wilson, who is over Starner had his say. “You can’t come here every day and expect to steal money from the man,” he told us. “You’re putting his job on the line,” he said, referring to Starner. “You’re putting my job on the line.”
Now how can it be that these supervisors have just now discovered that we’ve been “messing off” and stealing the man’s money for over two months without their knowing it? Either this whole thing about being out of hours is bullshit (the general opinion) or they have been asleep at the wheel. Or both. I vote for both. But I do know where a lot of lost hours have gone. On Friday we all spent the last two hours of the day pulling back lines – extension cords, air hoses, and welding lines – this was to impress somebody – and then we had to run them again this morning in order to do any work. And then there’s all the hours wasted on these bullshit meetings.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Toilet Topics
Okay, last post I said I’d talk about my poor survival skills, but that’s a complicated one, so it’ll have to wait a day or two.
The Navy, in our performance of shipboard work, requires us to have "firewatches" whenever we are doing hotwork. Hotwork is welding, burning (cutting with a torch), or grinding. Anything that produces fire or sparks. Depending on the location and type of work we may have to have one or two or, in some cases, even more firewatches present on the job. The firewatches are unskilled laborers who have undergone a couple of hours of training and are handed a fire extinguisher. They are women for the most part, generally uneducated. The majority are black. Some work for our company directly, others are "contractors," a term used for anyone coming from a temp agency. They are paid low wages, between $7 and $10 an hour.
This morning I overheard my firewatch recounting to a co-worker a conversation I had had with her yesterday. We’ll call her Margaret. She is a shortish, heavyset black woman, aged 49.
Yesterday, she was telling one of the people working with me about a firewatch she knew on second shift who had just been caught smoking on the ship and fired. She noted that it had been stupid of the woman to smoke on the ship, given how closely second shift was being watched. The conversation then turned to the reason second shift was being watched so closely; namely, that--so it is said--there have been repeated instances of people pissing in plastic soda or water bottles and leaving them on the ship, or taking a shit in places not designated for that purpose. Needless to say, this is somewhat embarrassing for the company. I’ve been curious about why anyone would do this, so I asked Margaret why she thought they did it. I should say that the company maintains two or three porta-johns on the ship. These are cleaned every morning, but with hundreds of workers on the ship they get pretty gross anyway, and I’m sure they’re even worse by the time second shift gets to them. Well, Margaret said she didn’t know and wouldn’t condone such activity, but admitted that sometimes on the job she had to pee real bad, and that she refuses to use the porta-johns. Presumably because of lack of cleanliness, but I think there’s also a widely-held belief that disease can be transmitted through using them. I should also note that since the ship is in drydock, using the bathrooms at the head of the pier is something of a journey. There are, I think, 46 steps down the stairs of the drydock wingwall (then, of course, up again), not to mention climbing the gangway off and on the ship to the drydock or off and on the drydock to the pier.
Anyhow, the interesting part to me was that, given Margaret’s reluctance to use the porta-johns, I asked her if she had never used an outhouse. Not only did she say she had never used one, which seemed surprising enough, she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen one and I had to describe them to her, both outside and in and how you used them--that is, by sitting on the hole in a board. The only thing she could say was that she remembered someone talking about having to tell the kids not to play near the outhouse. What was surprising to me about this was that Margaret was born in and lived all her life in the city where our shipyard is located. Now I can recall, not more than 20 or 25 years ago, seeing outhouses in the countryside of our state, not more than an hour or two away from us. You’d see these behind the sorts of houses that looked like they might once have belonged to sharecroppers. I’m sure there are parts of our state where some people still don’t have indoor plumbing.
I come from another state, originally, a more prosperous state where everyone had indoor plumbing. Still, there have been quite a few times in the past when I have used outhouses--sometimes on camping trips, but other times elsewhere, such as public parks or rest stops, and I’m not that much older than Margaret. Yet she never had that dubious experience, even though she’s black and living so close to an area where the country blacks, at least until recent memory, have had to rely on them.
The Navy, in our performance of shipboard work, requires us to have "firewatches" whenever we are doing hotwork. Hotwork is welding, burning (cutting with a torch), or grinding. Anything that produces fire or sparks. Depending on the location and type of work we may have to have one or two or, in some cases, even more firewatches present on the job. The firewatches are unskilled laborers who have undergone a couple of hours of training and are handed a fire extinguisher. They are women for the most part, generally uneducated. The majority are black. Some work for our company directly, others are "contractors," a term used for anyone coming from a temp agency. They are paid low wages, between $7 and $10 an hour.
This morning I overheard my firewatch recounting to a co-worker a conversation I had had with her yesterday. We’ll call her Margaret. She is a shortish, heavyset black woman, aged 49.
Yesterday, she was telling one of the people working with me about a firewatch she knew on second shift who had just been caught smoking on the ship and fired. She noted that it had been stupid of the woman to smoke on the ship, given how closely second shift was being watched. The conversation then turned to the reason second shift was being watched so closely; namely, that--so it is said--there have been repeated instances of people pissing in plastic soda or water bottles and leaving them on the ship, or taking a shit in places not designated for that purpose. Needless to say, this is somewhat embarrassing for the company. I’ve been curious about why anyone would do this, so I asked Margaret why she thought they did it. I should say that the company maintains two or three porta-johns on the ship. These are cleaned every morning, but with hundreds of workers on the ship they get pretty gross anyway, and I’m sure they’re even worse by the time second shift gets to them. Well, Margaret said she didn’t know and wouldn’t condone such activity, but admitted that sometimes on the job she had to pee real bad, and that she refuses to use the porta-johns. Presumably because of lack of cleanliness, but I think there’s also a widely-held belief that disease can be transmitted through using them. I should also note that since the ship is in drydock, using the bathrooms at the head of the pier is something of a journey. There are, I think, 46 steps down the stairs of the drydock wingwall (then, of course, up again), not to mention climbing the gangway off and on the ship to the drydock or off and on the drydock to the pier.
Anyhow, the interesting part to me was that, given Margaret’s reluctance to use the porta-johns, I asked her if she had never used an outhouse. Not only did she say she had never used one, which seemed surprising enough, she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen one and I had to describe them to her, both outside and in and how you used them--that is, by sitting on the hole in a board. The only thing she could say was that she remembered someone talking about having to tell the kids not to play near the outhouse. What was surprising to me about this was that Margaret was born in and lived all her life in the city where our shipyard is located. Now I can recall, not more than 20 or 25 years ago, seeing outhouses in the countryside of our state, not more than an hour or two away from us. You’d see these behind the sorts of houses that looked like they might once have belonged to sharecroppers. I’m sure there are parts of our state where some people still don’t have indoor plumbing.
I come from another state, originally, a more prosperous state where everyone had indoor plumbing. Still, there have been quite a few times in the past when I have used outhouses--sometimes on camping trips, but other times elsewhere, such as public parks or rest stops, and I’m not that much older than Margaret. Yet she never had that dubious experience, even though she’s black and living so close to an area where the country blacks, at least until recent memory, have had to rely on them.
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