Handling mid-sea situations on campus
K. RAMACHANDRAN
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This campus on ship, erected with all necessary equipment, can help students learn all about handling real-time situations.
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Photo: S. R. Raghunathan
CAMPUS ON BOARD: Trainee cadets in marine engineering at Vel's Srinivasa College of Engineering, trying out the simulator equipment of the `Ship on campus'.
The world's big shipping powers are busy looking for talented and qualified marine engineers, but the supply from India is not that great. The global shipping trade requires at the present moment about 50,000 marine engineers at various levels starting from a cadet in the engine to the chief engineer of big super tankers, according to Capt. K. Vivekanand, director of Vel's Academy of Maritime Engineering and Training (VAMET).
India has hardly half a dozen institutions providing high-end B.Tech marine engineering courses.
One of them — VAMET — did something different last week. It unveiled a new ship on campus, a completely steel hulk of a ship knocked down from Alang (breaking yard in Gujarat) and completely re-built at its Thalambur campus south of Chennai.
"The Directorate General of Shipping whose approval is required for starting and teaching the four- year engineering programme, had mandated sometime ago that the approved colleges should have a ship-on-campus, and we went about searching for the right kind of ship and landed up a 3,000 tonne-ship," says Capt. Vivekanand.
College chairman Isari K Ganesh said it took nearly 16-18 months to bring it down and erect the ship on campus — a massive steel bulk set inside the concrete structure.
With the expertise provided by the Indian Institute of Technology-Kharagpur, the college has also created a simulated version of the ship's engine and piping.
This simulator room that cost Rs.1.5 crore has a full scale `soft' version of the engine.
A whole panel on a side wall has all the complicated plumbing and hydraulics, while the other wall has the power supply systems. In between them lies a range of computing equipment that simulates the ship's internal systems.
"With the software we have we can introduce problems and ask the students to solve them. We let the students handle a completely real-time situation, in much the same way they would handle it in mid-sea. The ship on campus even has a tool and machine room so that they can produce components or tools for the machinery," Captain Vivekanand notes.
Inside the `ship' are cranes and hauling equipment, a secure carbondioxide room (used for fighting mid-sea fire).
The ships engines work perfectly and even the propeller can turn as real. "We have just removed the shaft connecting the engine and the propeller. Everything else is very much a real life ship... " Mr. Ganesh adds.
Outside the bulk is a parade ground whose frontage is a full-scale mast cut down from the ship, full with the foghorn and a `crow's nest' for the look-out on board.
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