Hosted by OSOS , contributed by Piraeus Marine… on 3 June 2019
Marine pollution represents one of major issues a ship's crew members will have to face in their professional everyday life. Transporting perteoleum products with oil tanker vessels and conducting risky ship operations (e.g fuel oil bunkering) may end up in contaminating the marine environment and polluting hundreds of square miles of sea and coastlines. Ship accidents (e.g. collisions or grounding in shallow waters) due to the crew's poor navigational and manoeuvring skills may also have catastrophic results for the environment. This kind of pollution will eventually affect the local community as local industries which rely on clear sea waters will be put out of business.
The 9th Piraeus Vocational School is a Maritime Direction School aiming at assisting young seafarers to acquire competences for their future professional life and preparing them for attending the Merchant Maritime Academies (Tertiary Eduation). During the third year of their education the students decide to train either as Deck Crew (Skippers/Captains) or as Engine Crew (Engineeers). Some of them have gained professional experience as they have already worked as non-certified crew members.
Our project was designed to engage the students in innovative activities that will allow them to study marine pollution incidents. They will focus on petroleum oil spills and how these may affect the sea environment; the reasons why such incidents take place; the law-abiding responsibilities the crew members hold to avoid pollution during ship operations and the ethical responsibilities the seagoers hold against the local communities to protect the enviroment. Technological tools will be at their disposal so as to specify ways to use them in indentifying and preventing pollution.
In different phases of the project the students will work in groups to:
1. Identify and document oil pollution in the Port of Piraeus using on-line or hardcopy maps - the Port of Piraeus is the largest port of Greece with heavy marine traffic and the closest one to our school - it will offer our students the opportunity to see in first-hand what an oil pollution may look like and specify the ship operations during which such pollution may occur
2. Study the nature/properties of Petroleum and its behaviour when in sea water - in this phase the students will visit the Hellenic Petroleum Refineries in Aspropyrgos - the company is one of the largest in South East Europe and specializes in supplying, reifining and trading petroleum products.
3. Document and discuss former accidents that resulted in large oil spills especially near the coastline (such as the recent wreck at the Saronikos Gulf, affecting miles of the Attica coastlines) - this is a real-life showcase of how such an accident may affect the local communities and the industries - a visit to the Hellenic Center for Marine Research will further help students discuss the effects of the oil contamination to the sea life.
4. Specify how technology could help in identifying oil pollution in the sea (e.g. by collecting samples of sea water that can be later analyzed to detect signs of oil slicks)
5. Discuss in groups the international regulations (International Maritime Organization - IMO) for avoiding collision at the sea and preventing pollution. Recent amendments made and general conventions for maritime safety while carrying out different operations (such as bunkering) will be part of their agenda.
6. Discuss ethics and their responsibility as professional crew members towards the local society.
The outcomes of the students' activities will be communicating with other stakeholders in an attempt to disseminate the results and inform the local community on the students' findings.
להרגיש
Student: dimitra_datsi
Addressed Challenge: this FEEL phase will be used to familiarize the students with the problem of oil pollution in the Port of Piraeus - we expect the students to visit the port and identify parts of the sea where it is obvious that pollution has occured. We will encourage the students to mark such areas on their maps - these could be virtual on-line maps or even hardcopy ones - and discuss:
1. the form the pollution has taken & its extends,
the extends (effects) could be discussed as following:
A) concerning local communitities
B) nearby and sourounding areas
C) biomes in the affected areas
2. the reasons why such a pollution has taken place,
discussing the crew's and shipping company's responsibilities taking into account the IMO regulations
3. the responsibilities crew members hold while transferring oil and carrying out bunkering operations.
while refearing to the ethical responsibilities.
In this phase the students will also be encouraged to read newspapers and articles referring to a major oil spill coming from a sunken vessel in Saronikos Gulf in September 2017 (see image below). The ecological disaster has taken the Athens suburbs by storm as the slick extended for miles and several beaches were out of reach for the people. The ship has been previously considered officially "seaworthy".
(dimitra_datsi)
Student: a_filippopoulos
Addressed Challenge: this FEEL phase will be used to familiarize the students with the problem of oil pollution in the Port of Piraeus - we expect the students to visit the port and identify parts of the sea where it is obvious that pollution has occured. We will encourage the students to mark polluted areas on their maps - these could be virtual on-line maps or even hardcopy ones - and discuss and analyse many topics such as:
1. the form the pollution has taken & its extends,
2. the reasons why such a pollution has taken place,
3. the responsibilities crew members hold while transferring oil and carrying out bunkering operations.
4.how technology can help in solving and overcoming oil pollution problems.
5.search and research that has been done in previous collisions in order to collect informations.
6.ways to prevent ship collisions that can lead to disasterous oil spills.
7.organisations/industries that help in reducing oil pollution.
In this phase the students will also be encouraged to read newspapers and articles referring to a major oil spill coming from a sunken vessel in Saronikos Gulf in September 2017 (see image below). The ecological disaster has taken the Athens suburbs by storm as the slick extended for miles and several beaches were out of reach for the people. The ship has been previously considered officially "seaworthy".
(a_filippopoulos)
לדמיין
Student: dimitra_datsi
Moving on from the "Feel Phase" in which they will study a "real"-life event (such as the Saronikos Gulf spill), the students will then have to pass to the "Imagine" phase.
In this part of their activities, they will work together in groups to "imagine"-specify the reasons WHY such a large oil pollution would take place. To do so they will have work towards two different directions:
1. Towards understanding the nature of the petroleum products and their behaviour when in sea water and
2. Towards studying International Maritime Organization (IMO) rules and their violations that could eventually lead in sea accidents and oil pollution at the sea.
3. The company's role into all these matters and finally the eco-friendly stanses they present themselves to have.
Documenting ways in which technology could help in identifying oil pollution in the sea (e.g by collecting samples of sea water that can be later analyzed to detect signs of oil) is also in our field of interest for this phase.
Regarding the resources needed from technology point of view:
In order to be able to collect sufficient data, the students have to use a computerized system that will be able to somehow detect or/and map pollution.
(dimitra_datsi)
b
יצירה
Student: dimitra_datsi
In this part of their work, the students will come together to discuss their findings with regard to the "Feel" and "Imagine" phases. They will need to create a common document using Google Docs, working alltogether, or any other platform to explain:
1. the properties of the petroleum products and the reason why its behaviour while at sea results in such extensive pollution
2. the IMO regulations to avoid collision and pollution at the sea
In this phase, the students will also need to explore their options in putting together a technological system that will be able to collect some kind of data in order to identify or map pollution at the sea. The kind of sensors to be used in this project will be thoroughly discussed.
(dimitra_datsi)
Student: n_s_stamatelos
My idea is to discus with my fellow students our options for creating a system to identify pollution.
- I will ask them to find the sensors on the system.
-i will ask them to create the programm that we conrtol to data from the sensor (live or not)
-i will ask to find same examples to make these statring points for our project
-i will ask them to find same sensors with low energy consumption.
-i will ask them the source of energy (sun panel or batteries).
-i will ask them find out a sensor that can give us as an output of the errors from the other sensors.
And we do many ''test drives'' to make sure the system works correctly - every time something goes wrong we will discuss again with my team to find the problems and correct them. will we record everything from the project in a power point and Google Docs.
Our ideas to discuss with the other students in my team:
- I will ask them to search google to find sensors
- I will ask them to create the program that controls the sensors to check the data live or not
- I will ask them to find other systems to be starting points to our project
- I will ask them to find a sensor that works as an output for the errors the other sensors
- - I will ask them to find the energy source (battery or sun panel)
We will do many “test-drives” to find if ti works correctlly – each time something goes wrong we will discuss the problems with my team and we will try to find the problem and correct it
(n_s_stamatelos)