Pictured: GO Marine Services recruits Sam Randle and Kevin Birotte (second and third from left, respectively), and (third name) recently learned basic maritime firefighting skills on the first of their five-day STCW training.
With good training comes a sense of self-confidence and teamwork that makes a significant difference in achieving success, no matter what position someone plays on a team.
The maritime environment is particularly challenging, given the mix of giant machines, tumultuous and often unforgiving seas, weather and long hours requiring unwavering focus. The knowledge that comes with good training is everything.
For recruits (pictured) at Guice Offshore sister company GO Marine Services, our training accomplishes both, ensuring a working knowledge of the International Maritime Organization’s International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW), a part of U.S. regulation and policy that sets qualification standards for certain personnel on seagoing ships.
Both Guice Offshore and GO Marine Services train our crew members to a standard of quality and then provide additional training depending on a mission’s complexity and geographical location.
“Whatever the client job requires, we take care of it,” GO Marine Services Accounts Manager Scott Duplantis explained. “Our customers’ needs drive additional training. One example would be if we’re in the harsher conditions above the 35th parallel, where mariners often work in freezing temperatures.
First established in 1978, the STCW prescribes minimum standards relating to training, certification and watchkeeping for seafarers which countries are obliged to meet or exceed.
Basic STCW training includes:
- Personal survival techniques to survive at sea in the event of an emergency
- Fire prevention and basic firefighting
- Elementary first aid; responding to and caring for an injured person
- Personal safety and social responsibility; accident prevention and basic safety procedures.
- Security awareness at sea
“What is most important to convey about our safety program at Guice Offshore is our internal commitment of choosing to maintain an attitude of following the safety rules and procedures versus having to follow them,” Duplantis added. “When we live a daily workplace culture of caring for our fellow employees and ensuring everyone goes home safely each day, we create a mindset that is intolerant of any level of injury.”
Guice Offshore embodies its safety measures in a company-wide policy called “GO Safely.”
It reads:
GO Safely to an Incident and Injury-Free Culture
- It is about caring for one another and demonstrating that care on a daily basis.
- It is about all workers going home safely every day.
- It is about a mindset intolerant of any level of injury.
- It is about taking responsibility for your own safety and those that work with you and around you.
- It is about being proactive and asking questions such as what is the most dangerous thing that can happen to me on this job/task and how can I mitigate against it?
- It is about an attitude of choosing to follow the safety rules and procedures (versus having to follow them).
- It is about speaking up and expressing your concern when you see something unsafe.
GO Marine Services (GOMS) is a premier provider of catering personnel, roustabouts and general labor services to the marine and oil and gas industries in the Gulf of Mexico and East Coast.
