January is a time for reflection. Former SAL Chairman and Director of Shipping Australia, Ken Fitzpatrick, reflects on fifty years of working in the shipping industry.
Mr Fitzpatrick writes:
“Those of us who can look back half a century are looking into a world far different from the one we live in today. The pace of change is now so fast for most people it is hard to keep up to date with events.
“My earliest recollections of shipping were in Fremantle as a boy, and of men lining up early in the morning to be picked to work on the wharves for the day. The successful ones got to heave heavy bags of grain off rail trucks and hurl them into slings, which were then lifted into the ship using the ships’ three to five ton union purchase derricks. Inside the hold of the two or three deck ship, workers took the bags out of the slings and stowed them in the ship. It was hard work, but they were the lucky ones to get the job for the day. The others had to go home or try elsewhere for casual work for the day.
“By the time I actually got to start work in the industry in 1967, bulk grain was loaded in bulk carriers, monster ships at that time of 30/50,000 tons
deadweight. That was the era when container shipping had just started, with the Kooringa plying the trade between Eastern and Western Australia. Western Australia had its own fleet of six ships trading to the northwest of the State and into Darwin, from Fremantle and return. The only exception was the Koolama, which went east after Darwin and completed a round Australia trade, taking all kinds of cargo, including 12 passengers.
“Steam ships were not uncommon in those days… [and]… the pioneering trade of container shipping in Australia grew quickly within the country, with cellular ships Kanimbla and Manoora taking up the coastal trade in 1969… fully containerised ships of a nominal capacity of some 13/1500 TEU saw the end of conventional liner ships carrying general cargo.“
Mr Fitzpatrick’s recollections continue with a remembrance of how the refrigerated trades have changed, the effect of globalisation, the evolution of ships and shipping in Australia, the changes in workplace safety and security, industrial action and the Patrick waterfront dispute.
“When asked if I would spend my time in shipping again, I quickly answer in the affirmative,” Mr Fitzpatrick writes.
To find out more – and it is worth reading – a first hand account of how our industry has changed download Mr Fitzpatrick’s “Half a century of change” retrospective here.
