Marine Compliance Alliance To Hold Annual Workshop
Marine Compliance Alliance will hold its third annual workshop August 6-8 at the Carson Center in Paducah, Ky.
The workshop is geared toward inland marine compliance professionals and rotates each year between Paducah and New Orleans.
Executive director Mark Sawyer said the workshop is an opportunity to hear from subject matter experts about Coast Guard and other regulatory body policy changes as well as best practices and lessons learned to enhance safety and compliance.
The first morning of the workshop will feature invited speakers and panelists, while case studies will be presented in the afternoon. On the second and third days, ABS marine root cause investigation training will be offered. However, registration for the training on those days has reached capacity.
One of the highlights this year will be the Shipyard Availability Panel, featuring panelists from McGinnis, Wepfer Marine, James Marine, Conrad and the Coast Guard. Josef Vlach of James Marine will moderate the panel.
As the marine industry moves forward with the requirement for credit drydock inspections to renew certificates of inspection, finding drydock space could be challenging without good planning, especially on short notice, Sawyer said.
“You’ll have some of the leading shipyards participating that can give a status update of their availability and challenges they’re seeing, as well as recommendations for planning drydock space,” he said.
A presentation from the Coast Guard Office of Commercial Vessel Compliance on Subchapter M policy and compliance trends is also noteworthy, Sawyer said. It is aimed at highlighting compliance trends and recent and notable policy changes, including the recent vessel modification flowchart, Sawyer said.
“The other thing I’m excited about is we’re going to have a third-party organization oversight panel that will clarify roles and responsibilities between various third-party organization oversight entities,” he said. “I think this will be interesting in understanding third-party organizational oversight performance indicators, alignment and strategy.”
Finally, Sawyer said the ABS marine root cause investigation training will include investigative strategies and techniques.
“This is an opportunity to bolster that skillset,” he said.
The workshop is free to Marine Compliance Alliance members and members of the Coast Guard. The cost is $150 for nonmembers. Additional information about the workshop, including the complete agenda, is available at marinecompliancealliance.com/workshop.
