Star-crossed voyage…

HOW AGENTS COPED WITH ‘SIRIUS’ SAGA

Can you recall what you were doing on 9/11? There’s more than one reason why Roland Malins-Smith of Seafreight Agencies has vivid memories of that fateful time – it coincided with a ship grounding that tested his skills in crisis management to the very limit. Here is his account of those stressful days.

It was the week before 9/11. The working week at Seafreight Agencies began with a desperate search for a substitute vessel for our scheduled Friday 7th sailing as the regular one had broken down. Our shipbroker, Joe Vidal, produced what appeared to be a suitable vessel that Wednesday at Jacksonville, voicing amazement that luck seemed always to be on our side when it came to finding replacement tonnage at short notice. I looked over the surveyor’s emailed pictures of the ‘Sirius’, which seemed rather less presentable than I would have preferred, and made a mental note to visit the ship when it berthed at Port Everglades.

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