Page 26 - Navigator 20

FOR ALL INCOMING TRIPS TO ROTTERDAM AND AMSTERDAM
Ordering pilots online!
AS OF SEPTEMBER 2020, INCOMING PILOTAGE TRIPS
TO THE PORTS OF ROTTERDAM AND AMSTERDAM ARE ORDERED COMPLETELY DIGITALLY. IT IS A MAJOR CHANGE THAT WILL RESULT IN SMOOTHER PORT CALLS FOR ALL PARTIES INVOLVED ONCE EVERYONE HAS GOT USED TO IT. OPERATIONS MANAGER ELCO OSKAM AND MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER GERRIT PEEKSTOK DISCUSS THE PREPARATIONS, THE INTRODUCTION AND THE EXPECTATIONS IN THE PILOTAGE REGION ROTTERDAM-RIJNMOND.
In the new working method for inbound trips, initiated by the Port of Rotterdam Authority, the Port of Amsterdam and the nautical service providers, an agent dispatches a first notification to the harbour master no later than 24 hours before the ETA of a ship. That is no different than before. What is new though is the requirement to actually place
a digital order three hours before the required pilotage time. This
is done via Portbase, which manages the Port Community System
of the Dutch seaports and which the agents also use to perform all other vessel notifications. Oskam: “For our planners at Loodswezen Rotterdam-Rijnmond, this is a real improvement. We now know what to expect three hours ahead of time. We confirm that order with the agent. Furthermore, we are now able to coordinate inbound journeys with other nautical service providers such as tugs and thus incorporate them in the planning.”
PREVIOUSLY A GREY AREA
Previously, the process surrounding visiting ships was very much a grey area. The agent provided an ETA no later than 24 hours in advance together with the first notification to the harbour master; from there, this info was also passed on to the pilots. After that, everyone - including the agent - had to wait and see when exactly the ship would arrive. Oskam: “The following step would not occur until the ship was within VHF range, on average about 1.5 hours before arriving at the pilot station. All stakeholders, from agent to port authority, would next discuss whether the ship could enter immediately or had to wait at
sea first, for example in anticipation of a berth. Since it poses quite a logistical challenge to be on time at sea, we would already reserve a pilot though. However, it could be that a ship would still need to wait offshore. Factually speaking, there was no official time of ordering. Digital ordering has now changed all this.”
DATA-DRIVEN CONTROL
A secondary effect of the new digital ordering of incoming pilot journeys is that all steps are now automatically recorded. A big difference with the past, where everything was done by telephone
and VHF and nothing was consequently logged. Peekstok: “With the help of the data that we currently have available, we are able to further improve the planning and thus the functioning of the port. In addition,
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