# OK then ! Your most memorable "Payoff"



## Steven Lamb (Apr 18, 2009)

Was it the party you slung on your tab the night before ?
The journey home on the plane / train ?
Buying 'prezzies' for the kids and the look of delight on their faces ?
Saying 'tarrah' to the BOT wife ?

Share your stories if you dare !

Cheers
Lamby
(Jester)[=P](H)(Thumb):sweatSmoke)


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## Naytikos (Oct 20, 2008)

Next time, I'll keep my mouth shut!
The most memorable was leaving a VLCC at Rastanura, having been up for 48 hours fixing a difficult fault on the main transmitter during which I, being half asleep, put my hand and arm into the final stage drawer whilst standing on the bench but without first killing the HT. Got a 2kV jolt and fell off the bench with my arm caught in the transmitter and the fuse absolutely refusing to blow.
Then 36 hours in a hotel in Dammam waiting for Beirut airport to open; nothing but Coca-cola and orange juice to drink, of course. Get to Beirut and the revolution starts up again. It took a while to get out of there to Cyprus, where the Greek and Turkish Cypriots were going through one of their spats and so Nicosia airport was closed and I ended up in Larnaka (I think!).
From there I managed to get to Athens and relative peace.


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## Steven Lamb (Apr 18, 2009)

Naytikos said:


> Next time, I'll keep my mouth shut!
> The most memorable was leaving a VLCC at Rastanura, having been up for 48 hours fixing a difficult fault on the main transmitter during which I, being half asleep, put my hand and arm into the final stage drawer whilst standing on the bench but without first killing the HT. Got a 2kV jolt and fell off the bench with my arm caught in the transmitter and the fuse absolutely refusing to blow.
> Then 36 hours in a hotel in Dammam waiting for Beirut airport to open; nothing but Coca-cola and orange juice to drink, of course. Get to Beirut and the revolution starts up again. It took a while to get out of there to Cyprus, where the Greek and Turkish Cypriots were going through one of their spats and so Nicosia airport was closed and I ended up in Larnaka (I think!).
> From there I managed to get to Athens and relative peace.


Naytikos
Some pay-off that was ! Hope you managed to squeeze in a few well deserved beers in Athens.

Rgds
Lamby(Pint)


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## commander (Oct 13, 2010)

After driving NOL LAGENO, formerly OSAKA BAY, up the beach at Chittagong in 1998 and leaving via pilot ladder and lifeboat we waded ashore and were then transported in mini-buses on a hair-raising drive to an hotel where we stayed overnight. My window looked directly into a sweat shop six feet away where you could see women and children slaving away at sewing machines. The electric wire from the bedside light ran under the threadbare carpet to the door. I recall the food was terrible, but there was some nondescript bottled beer available. Next afternoon we were loaded onto a bus for the journey to Dhaka. Mant hours later in the middle of the night were poured out int another hotel where there were not enough rooms available so I tried to sleep in a dirty easy chair in the foyer, watching rats run up and down the stairs. Not sure but don't think there was any food provided, but there were some rather basic showers. In the morning back into the bus to the airport. The trip through the city's traffic which included wandering cows was amazing. At the airport we had to run the gauntlet of hoards of beggars to get inside the terminal. Our guide suggested we should make a collection for the customs officials so all chipped in twenty dollars. Worked a treat. We were soon in the air en route to Bangkok. Then a change of plane and winging our way to Heathrow where we arrived 54 hours after leaving the ship.


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## lakercapt (Jul 19, 2005)

On my last day on Scottish Monarch before I was to fly home on vacation from Osaka after a ten month stint.
Was walking on the main deck during the stevedores lunch break. We were discharging wheat using clams and ships gear.
One winchman was showing a rookie how to use the two winch's ((union purchase) using the side by side controls and the clam swung and smashed me against the hatch coming.
Was taken to the hospital and fortunately no bones were broken but by this time I had a massive bruise from my waist to my little toe. Fascinated the medical staff. Wanted to keep me in but I got on the plane next day and arrived home safe and sound.
When my wife and I were in the at last in the bedroom I told here not to be surprised when I took my pants off.
She was, for more than one reason!!!!!!!!


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## Criffh (Feb 27, 2006)

Sugar Line MV Sugar Producer, paying off in Belfast after a Great Lakes voyage. On the return North Atlantic crossing, several items on deck, including nav lights, were sabotaged. The master informed the company, and two Belfast CID officers were waiting to board as we came alongside. No one was to leave the ship until they had conducted their enquiries. The CID set up their office in an unused cabin, next to the officers' bar, and individually interviewed most of the crew, and several of the officers who had been implicated by the crew. This included the fourth engineer, and third mate, whose 21st birthday happened to be on that very day.
Once the CID men had finished interviewing, they joined us in the bar, where a birthday party was in full swing. Several hours' and a quantity of beer later, it was time for them to leave, and they then broke the news that they'd come to the conclusion that the guilty man was indeed the third mate, who by now was quite well inebriated. They grabbed him, and dragged him, kicking and screaming, out of the bar and down the alleyway. Naturally, we were all very shocked at this. Not for long though, as once they thought he'd had enough they let him go and wished him a happy birthday! Only joking!
Two days' later, the first-trip deck boy was arrested, and we were all paid off and on our way home. I bet that 3rd mate never forgot his 21st!


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## alan ward (Jul 20, 2009)

Once paid off the England after two trips with 4 pence ha`penny.Labrador Clipper paid in Rouen because we were headed up the Kiel canal to the Baltic and couldn`t leave in Soviet held territory.On the morning of my departure the OM said`Here`s some travel expenses,oh and three crew members who are leaving as well`Now I`d been looking forward to a nice little trip home,perhaps a croissant or two,a strong coffee perhaps a Gauloises hanging nonchalantly from my lip as I leant over the rail of the ferry dreaming of home and looking a cool sophisticated seafarer in the Joseph Conrad mouldthe`I`ve been to hell and back `sort of image.Instead I wound up with a caterpillar of men following me around and struggling to remember enough of my O level French to buy 5 tickets to Le Havre,then 5 tickets to Newhaven and on to Euston where finally I was alone.It was harder work than the voyage had been!


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## Trevor Clements (May 6, 2007)

I paid off the Hyrcania in Eastham in 1961, and she had been a rather unhappy ship. The Chief Engineer and Chief Steward had a fight at the pay off, The Captain pinched my docking bottle on the excuse that I was too young to be carrying a bottle of gin (19years old), and I hadn't enough money for the taxi fare through the Mersey tunnel to the Marconi offices.

When I got to the Marconi Offices the ROU man asked me what had happened, (I think there had been some reports by someone), so I told him in company with my proposed relief, and the three of us went back to the ship together. I cant remember the outcome, but I recall my relief a man of considerably more experience than I was reluctant to join the old tub when he heard what had happened during the trip. Who says Marconi's are sentimental? They gave me a smart new motorship and I stayed on her for two years.
Trevor


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## surfaceblow (Jan 16, 2008)

When I left the USNS Harkness in Oman the Military Attaché refused to sign my travel papers so that I could leave the vessel and go to the airport. The reason for the refusal was that he had invited the Navy Personnel on the vessel to the Marine Barracks for a party. For some reason the Marines were not to happy with that the party guest removed from the Marine Barracks. 

So I had to remain onboard the Harkness until we left the Omani airspace and took a helicopter ride to a Airbase just south of the Iranian Sea. From this Airbase I caught a ride to Diego Gracia with the workers from base. The workers were not permitted to stay on the base overnight so they were flow off and on daily. On arrival to Diego Gracia I was assigned a room at the Officer Bachelor Quarters with some Ensign. This Ensign had a nasty habit of getting up before dawn. I also had to be put on the waiting list for a flight from Diego Gracia back to the States. The first plane was due to arrive mid week was delayed due to part of its tail assembly fell off over Kenya. So I had to stay ashore in Diego Gracia for another week when both the weekly flight and the repaired plane arrived. 

Normally a week in Diego is not bad but the week I spent ashore the Seaman's Club was closed for remodeling. So that left eating with the Navy Officers at the Officers Club and waiting until the bars opened in the evening. What really steamed me was that MSC started my vacation when I left the ship and not when I arrived home.

Joe


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## borderreiver (Oct 11, 2008)

Had a master who I did not get on with.(not from the time I was a cadet) He organised my relief . I was sailing as chief officer doing a off shore ship to ship transfer when the master told me my relief was on the way by tug and I had few mins to pack and hand over. Left the ship still in a oily boiler suit, The new chief officer was a old friend and still is so no problem . Arrived at the airport still in oily boiler-suit late check in given a seat. so took boiler suit off in the middle of the check in area and put shore rags on. straight on to air plane waiting for me to find my seat was in the middle seat of a lot of chain smokers and the seat piled high with pillows high which i throw at the plane crew demanding a change of seats to a non smoking due to my eyes. This was refused but the rest of the passages did not smoke until we got back to London. had a few days at home then returned to the same ship with another master.


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## Baulkham Hills (Jul 11, 2008)

After a long boring trip from Brazil to Bombay on the product tanker Cape Thistle in the mid eighties
I was due to pay off after seven months onboard. My relief came arrived and was found to have come into India on a business visa that precluded joining a ship.
This problem was sorted out, in the time honoured way of India, by a bribe.
There was a shortage of U.S. dollars due to the Master splurging on various activities in Brazil. About a dozen were due to pay off including a wife and a young child. The available currency worked out at U.S. 20 for each payoff.
We left the ship and went to a rundown hotel call the "Diplomat" close to the Taj
Hotel but a totally different world. Then the agent informed us that there were no
flights booked and just relax and enjoy Bombay (on 20 dollars). This ended up as a week in this dump with no money. Eventually we went to Bombay airport, on the way the agent said we would have to pay our own departure tax, he was very lucky he was not assaulted there and then but eventually he paid the tax for us.
We all caught our respective flights and it was a great relief to take off from Bombay and I was not the only one because all the passengers burst into applause as soon as we took off. 
I felt sorry for the guy with the wife and child because he ended up paying two thirds of the costs of the hotel etc. The company tried to include the week in Bombay as part of my vacation. It took months to sort that out.


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## Klaatu83 (Jan 22, 2009)

surfaceblow said:


> When I left the USNS Harkness in Oman the Military Attaché refused to sign my travel papers so that I could leave the vessel and go to the airport. The reason for the refusal was that he had invited the Navy Personnel on the vessel to the Marine Barracks for a party. For some reason the Marines were not to happy with that the party guest removed from the Marine Barracks.
> 
> So I had to remain onboard the Harkness until we left the Omani airspace and took a helicopter ride to a Airbase just south of the Iranian Sea. From this Airbase I caught a ride to Diego Gracia with the workers from base. The workers were not permitted to stay on the base overnight so they were flow off and on daily. On arrival to Diego Gracia I was assigned a room at the Officer Bachelor Quarters with some Ensign. This Ensign had a nasty habit of getting up before dawn. I also had to be put on the waiting list for a flight from Diego Gracia back to the States. The first plane was due to arrive mid week was delayed due to part of its tail assembly fell off over Kenya. So I had to stay ashore in Diego Gracia for another week when both the weekly flight and the repaired plane arrived.
> 
> ...


You're lucky MSC didn't make you pay your own expenses for the week you had to put up at Diego. I once ran into a seaman at the MSC office at Bayonne, who had just flown half way around the world from the Indian Ocean, after spending a year on the USNS Wilkes. Although he was exhausted after that long trip home, the geeks at the travel office insisted upon nickel-and-diming him over every single expense.

I, too, have had the experience of flying home from Diego Garcia. On one occasion the plane on which we were flying home stopped off in Syracuse, where it filled up with military dependents on their back to the States to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with their families. In this case, "Military dependents" meant lots of young wives with lots of babies. For sixteen hours not a moment went by that our ears weren't assailed by the crying of at least one infant, and it was usually more than one. Needless to say, nobody was allowed to say a word about it. After all, how could anybody possibly object to adorable little babies?


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## Robert M Hughes (Oct 16, 2010)

The old Standard oil tanker 'Sovac' plying the Med was finally sold to the Japanese breakers 'As she stood' which meant everything that could be sold en route was sold - deck stores, ropes, engine room metal etc etc was flogged mainly on passage through the Suez.

I was very lucky to have kept my aerials and only the ships's safety helped in that direction. We were barely able to tie up arriving in Yokohama. Fortunately I went straight to the Mitsubishi Yard at Nagasaki to join the Stanvac S. Africa new build where I stayed for 3 months. The Company ruled an allowance of three free beers for the (mainly Oz) officers during our stay at the Hotel - no restriction on basic food - they did ultimately query the number of 'sandwiches' we had ordered in the hotel bar.
Final episode was when the Stanoil Super arrived to find us all at dinner with our respective Japanese girlfriends. The maiden voyage speeded up after that !!
Bob


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## Klaatu83 (Jan 22, 2009)

The most memorable actual payoff I ever attended had to be one on Lykes Lines' old SS Gulf Shipper, a couple of photos of which are in this site's Gallery section. 

Lykes was an outfit that didn't do things the way other steamship companies did. One of their many peculiarities was that they used to pay their ships off, and lay them up for a week or so, if the next cargo wasn't ready immediately. Once the next cargo was available the company would simply call the crew back to break the ship out again. The particular payoff of which I allude was one of those occasions.

The company purser lined the crew up in the customary fashion and began paying them off. Suddenly, right in the middle of the proceedings, the lights went out and the room was left completely dark. It seems that the ship's engineers, ever a resourceful and enterprising lot, had all managed to get to head of the line to pay off first. Now that they had their money they were simply shutting off the power and going home!

There's a lesson in that: If you're ever going to lay up a ship, always make sure you pay the engineers off LAST!


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## Chris Isaac (Jul 29, 2006)

Third Officer on Reina del Mar.
Arrive Southampton with that cruise's BOT wife.
At the time engaged to girl in Union Castle dock office in Southampton.
Just paid off, standing on Promenade Deck enjoying the view, fiance comes up forward gangway just as BOT wife goes down the aft gangway.
By all the fine traditions of the Merchant Navy.they should have dipped panties as they passed. But who should have dipped to whom?


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## Robert M Hughes (Oct 16, 2010)

Take the Gold Medal Chris,

Bob


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## Irvingman (Jan 29, 2006)

Not my pay-off, but one I will always remember
My first trip as an Engineer Cadet and the 2nd had been on my case from the day I joined - I suspect he wasn't a fan of the Cadet system.
Anyway - the day he paid off he made me carry his bags down to the agents car waiting on the dockside. I put the cases and his briefcase into the back and was just pulling the tailgate down when he reached in to retrieve his briefcase.
WHACK - tailgate right on the noggin(LOL)
A very satisfying moment as he drove off into the sunset rubbing his bonce - never met him again![=P]


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## sparks69 (Dec 18, 2005)

Final pay off three days after wife contacted ship to say son was critically ill.
O/M Morris (bless him) said "you go in Gib nevermind if a relief hasn't arrived"
Longest four days of my life.
Outcome was good - he's 33 now !


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