Jack was easygoing. He never pursued an officer’s license or tried to hustle up the ranks; he preferred to avoid the messy politics aboard. He saw how cutthroat officers were; getting ahead wasn’t worth the increase in pay and the hassle. Guys with higher ranks would sit in union halls for days waiting for work but as a general able-bodied seaman, called an AB, Jack could always get work whenever the spirit moved him. Sailing, living free.
Decades later, Jack was still shipping out, and in a way, so was Eric. But Jack had fully embraced the seaman’s life; he lived alone in Jacksonville and had never married. During shore leave, he carved sculpture out of wood and painted dreamy Edward Hopper–like scenes. He once told Eric that when he retired, he planned on throwing an oar over his shoulder and walking west until someone asked him what it was.
Eric was pleased to see his fellow traveler on duty that night. Guys like Jack made the heavy workload on these short, busy runs down to San Juan go a little smoother.
Working ships are an obstacle course of cargo, safety equipment, and machinery and as Jack led Eric from the ramp to the ship’s house, he casually pointed out anything—raised thresholds, low headers—that Eric might trip over or bang his head on.
Though El Faro had an elevator, the captain on duty didn’t want the crew using it. Someone could get stuck in there. The machinery was old and cranky, and he worried that it might stop working entirely because the shipping company had stopped paying to have it inspected. If it did quit with someone inside, the ship’s engineers would have to spend their time fixing the lift instead of tending to the ship’s ancient steam plant.
So Jack and Eric climbed seven flights of industrial stairs bathed in fluorescent light to get to the navigation bridge. Each floor in the ship’s house served a function. Ascending, they passed the galley, the crews’ quarters, engineers’ quarters, deck officers’ quarters—each door clearly labeled—to the final set of stairs, through the door to the bridge where the captain and the third mate were waiting for them.
Nearly ten stories above the waterline, the navigation bridge was a single room atop the house with seven windows framing the evening sky as the sun set over Jacksonville. It smelled like old solder and aging wiring, an olfactory blast from the 1970s, a reminder that the ship was forty years old—built before the internet, laptops, and cellphones—and nearly double the age of the average ship docked in America’s ports.
Against the windows sat a file-cabinet-gray metal console as wide as the bridge, strewn with instruments. In the middle of the console, waist-high, was a small black steering wheel, like something you’d find on a Honda Civic. It was hard to believe that such an inconsequential thing controlled the massive rudder below. A couple of solid wood grab bars were attached to the console; even on this giant vessel, things could get rough. Tucked in the corner was the chartroom; a blackout curtain took the place of a door.
Captain Michael Davidson greeted Eric. Davidson was a Yankee like the pilot. He had signed on with the shipping company—TOTE—two years ago, and the pair had met here on the bridge a few times. Davidson stood a few inches shorter than Eric and wore his white-and-gray hair close cropped, military style. He had an athletic build, sharp nose, and Scottish eyes that sloped down in a friendly, generous way when he smiled, complementing his cleft chin. A slightly imperious manner betrayed his station as master of the ship. He shook Eric’s hand firmly, calling him “Mr. Pilot.”
“Hello, Cap’n,” Eric said.
Eric opened the door to the bridge wing and stepped into the warm evening air, high above the river. Below him, a pair of pelicans flew over the stacks of containers. Eric had a portable GPS system that came with an antenna that worked best out here; he positioned it carefully on the small deck, sheltered from the wind. The antenna sent his precise location back inside to his iPad, which was loaded with a detailed chart of the St. Johns River, its depths, and live traffic information. The keel of El Faro cut a wake three stories below the waterline, a comfortable depth for the river’s forty-foot dredged channel, but at various locations, tolerances were tight.
Eric’s handheld software was more sophisticated than El Faro’s onboard technology. El Faro didn’t have an electronic chart system, soon to be required of all international deep-draft vessels. Instead, her officers relied on their paper nautical charts published by NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), and a crude alphanumerical GPS interface.
Eric always steered ships with his eyes first, technology second. He knew the river like he knew the streets of his own neighborhood, but he regularly referred to his iPad to check his work.
Jack Jackson handed the pilot a cup of coffee and took the wheel at eight o’clock as two tugs below slowly spun El Faro 180 degrees to point her bow toward the Atlantic Ocean, 10.6 miles down the winding river. When she was in position, the tugs pulled their lines and El Faro glided silently forward under her own power. They were underway.
Eric stood in the dusk at the windows of El Faro’s bridge sipping his brew, watching the waterway bend before him. Lights from the houses along the shore revealed the river’s edge, but Eric closely monitored his iPad tracking the ship’s speed and position and the river’s depth. Stretched out before him was a field of red and blue cargo containers, loaded with every necessity for life in Puerto Rico, graying to black in the fading light.
At this time of night, there wasn’t much traffic on the river. The navigation bridge was quiet, illuminated only by the glow of the ship’s instruments as Jack stood at the steering wheel, watching for shrimp boats, pleasure boats, anything the huge ship could crush as it slowly made its way downriver.
In his resonant baritone, perfect for late-night jazz radio, Eric would occasionally call out a command, anticipating current changes ahead to keep the vessel on course. “Left 10.”
“Left 10,” Jack Jackson repeated from behind the wheel and turned accordingly, causing the ship’s massive rudder far below to swing ten degrees to port. The heavily loaded El Faro heeled over slightly with each turn. She was tender, sensitive, slow to right herself, but not unpleasant. That’s how this class of ship moved.
As usual, there was very little chatter among the people on the bridge, just another trip on a calm autumn evening down the coast of Florida. Mariners are comfortable standing in silence for hours at a time, staring out at the sea. It’s part of the job. Jack and Davidson talked a little about the weather with Eric. Something was brewing out there, but El Faro was a fast ship. Davidson said that the storm would cut north and they would shoot down under it.
Eric could hear Second Mate Danielle Randolph on the two-way radio overseeing the men securing the deck and organizing lines at the stern of the ship. She’d spent the whole afternoon directing stevedores and checking cargo. Soon she’d head back to her room to catch a few more hours of sleep before coming up on the bridge for her midnight watch.
“Dead slow ahead,” Eric said as they approached land’s end. When they reached St. Johns Point, just past Mayport Naval base, the coastline peeled back as El Faro moved into open waters. So far above it all, Eric could feel the thrum of the twenty-five-foot propeller turned by the ship’s steam turbine whenever they put on the rudder. By the time the ship reached the mouth of the river, stars were out. The vessel and her cargo were a black silhouette against the dusky sea and sky.
About seven miles out, just before ten o’clock, Eric retrieved his GPS antenna from the bridge wing, packed his bag, and shook the captain’s hand. Chief Mate Steve Shultz walked him down to the main deck. Eric looked over the side and saw his pilot boat pulling up alongside. He gingerly climbed down the rope ladder, made it safely to his ride, gripped the handrail of his boat and looked up. From the top of the ladder, Shultz smiled and waved. The pilot boat pulled away from El Faro and headed back toward the lights of Jacksonville.