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Companies have rules against drinking on the job for a reason.

What would you do if you were performing an IT system install on a large cargo vessel when the captain of the ship invited you to have lunch with him, but the lunch included plenty of drinking?

That is what happened to the IT guy in this story, and he made the mistake of drinking along with the captain. While he was able to successfully complete the install, he did end up feeling the consequences of his actions.

It is a funny story, but it definitely shows why drinking on the job is a bad idea. Read through the full story for yourself, and see what you think.

Another Ship, Another Server, Another CHENG With a Fire Sword

There was a cargo ship, the Iron Chieftain. She was a bulk ore carrier running the Newcastle, Sydney, Wollongong and Whyalla route, and by this stage I had become something of an unwilling specialist in installing IT infrastructure on large lumps of steel that stubbornly refused to remain in one place.

The first ship install had involved frantic planning, missing equipment, improvised engineering, international waters, customs officials and the threat of an unscheduled voyage to Venezuela.

By the time I got to the Iron Chieftain, though, I had the process down to a fine art.

Everything seems to be working as expected.

Server. Check.

UPS. Check.

Switch. Check.

Communications gear. Check.

Workstations. Check.

He has this down to a science.

Test.

Synchronise.

Sign-off.

Get off the ship.

Four hours, maybe five if something went wrong.

He is ready for anything.

I had spare cables. I had spare powerboards. I had spare adapters. I had tools. I had documentation. I had learned and remembered the most important lesson from the earlier deployments:

Assume everything you have been told about the ship is wrong until you physically see it yourself.

But…there was one thing I still hadn’t learned.

What is wrong with this guy?

Never underestimate a Ukrainian captain at lunchtime.

The Iron Chieftain’s senior crew were Ukrainian, including the Captain and CHENG, and the CHENG immediately demonstrated that he belonged to the same school of maritime engineering as the Chief Engineer from my previous adventure.

For those unfamiliar with the term, CHENG means Chief Engineer.

They work in a difficult environment, that’s for sure.

In my experience, the Chief Engineer aboard a ship is the person responsible for keeping several thousand tonnes of complicated machinery alive while surrounded by salt water, vibration and people asking why things aren’t working.

They are, therefore, remarkably practical individuals. Sometimes aggressively practical.

Need power somewhere? Run cable. Something in the way? Move it. Can’t move it? Cut it.

Need a hole through a steel bulkhead? There are probably many formally approved maritime engineering methods for creating one.

That’s one way of doing it.

This CHENG had a preferred method and it was also the fire sword, or, as other people insist on calling it, an oxy-acetylene cutting torch.

I would point at the place where I needed to route a cable.

He would look at the wall. Then at me. Then back at the wall.

There would be a brief pause while some internal engineering calculation occurred. Then: FWOOM.

Problem solved.

Hole.

He has learned to trust the guy.

I had reached the point where this barely concerned me anymore.

My original reaction to seeing someone attack part of a ship with an oxy torch had been something along the lines of: “Should you be doing that?”

By the Iron Chieftain installation, my response had evolved into: “Can you make it about five centimetres further to the left?”

When things are running smoothly, watch out for trouble.

Experience changes a man.

The install itself was almost disappointingly uneventful.

Everything arrived on schedule. The server powered up. The network behaved. The workstations connected. The communications link worked. No computers required emergency resurrection. Nobody had forgotten to mention that a critical workstation had been broken for six months. There were no nearby engine-room fires and, most importantly, nobody threatened to take me to South America.

Lunch with the captain sounds nice.

For once, I was actually ahead of schedule…….and this should have concerned me.

Around lunchtime, the Captain appeared and invited me to eat with him and the senior crew.

Now, there are certain invitations in life that are technically optional but, in reality, are not optional at all.

What a great opportunity.

When the Ukrainian captain of a bulk carrier invites the visiting IT engineer to lunch aboard his ship, you do not say: “No thanks, I brought a sandwich.”

You go to lunch.

So I went to lunch. And lunch was excellent.

Proper cooked food, generous portions and the sort of hospitality you tend to remember years later.

Do not drink on the job.

Then THE bottle appeared. Vodka…..proper Ukrainian Vodka. The kind with a capital “V”.

I was offered a glass.

This presented a minor professional dilemma.

On one hand, I was technically still working. On the other hand, I was sitting at the Captain’s table, surrounded by Ukrainian officers, and the Captain was holding a bottle of vodka.

He will regret this.

I considered the options.

There was really only one. I accepted the vodka.

One glass. Perfectly reasonable. A toast was made. We drank. Then another toast was made.

Apparently, Ukrainian maritime tradition contains significantly more things worth toasting than I had previously realised.

It’s all downhill from here.

Second vodka. Still fine. Lunch continued. Conversation continued.

Third vodka. At some point, I became aware that the bottle was spending an unreasonable amount of time near my glass.

Fourth vodka….or was that the fifth?

At this point, it seems that the captain wants him drunk.

Now, I should clarify something. These were not what an Australian publican would politely call a “standard drink”. There was no carefully measured 30 ml nip being poured from a bottle fitted with one of those little plastic spouts.

The Captain’s approach to alcohol measurement appeared to be based primarily on direct eye contact and optimism.

Eventually, lunch finished and I politely thanked the Captain and officers, returned to the equipment and completed my last checks.

Let’s see if everything is still working.

The server was operational. Communications were working. Data synchronisation was successful. Documentation was signed. Job done.

Four hours, exactly as planned. I packed my equipment and headed towards the gangway.

When I had arrived, the Iron Chieftain was tied securely to the wharf in Sydney Harbour. Sydney Harbour was calm. The weather was fine.

Wait. What is happening?

There was absolutely no meteorological reason whatsoever for what happened next because somewhere between the Captain’s dining room and the gangway, the sea state had apparently deteriorated dramatically.

The deck seemed to be moving. Not a lot, mind you. Just enough.

I adjusted. The deck adjusted back. Interesting. I reached the gangway.

My legs, which had performed adequately when I boarded several hours earlier, had apparently suffered some kind of simultaneous mechanical failure.

He had a bit too much vodka.

Left leg requested movement. Request timed out. Right leg attempted to compensate. Unexpected response from device. Retry?

I grabbed the railing. Clearly the ship was moving. That had to be it. It was a large bulk carrier. Ships move. This is basic physics.

Admittedly, it was tied to Sydney but perhaps Sydney was moving.

I began descending the gangway with enormous concentration. One foot. Step. Other foot. Step. Hold railing. Do not look like you have forgotten how legs work.

I would like to believe I maintained a dignified and professional appearance during this process. I have absolutely no evidence supporting that belief.

Now I see what is happening.

Eventually, I reached the wharf. Solid ground. Wonderful, dependable, non-moving ground.

Except it was also moving.

This was becoming concerning. Obviously there must have been unusually heavy seas affecting the Port of Sydney that afternoon. Extremely localised heavy seas. Possibly restricted entirely to a radius of approximately one metre around me.

I made my way slowly towards the exit carrying my backpack and tools while concentrating very carefully on walking in what I believed was a straight line.

Behind me, several members of the crew seemed extremely amused and entertained by something but I never discovered what.

At least everyone seems to have had a good time.

The server installation was a complete success and the ship returned to its normal Newcastle, Sydney, Wollongong and Whyalla run. The CHENG got another opportunity to use his beloved fire sword. The Captain provided excellent hospitality. And I learned another important lesson to add to my growing list of rules for maritime IT work:

If the Chief Engineer says he can make you a hole, stand back. If the Captain invites you to lunch, accept. If the Captain offers you vodka, also accept.

But when the Captain offers you the fourth vodka or maybe a fifth?…remember that Sydney Harbour is apparently prone to sudden and extremely localised heavy seas.

Especially around the gangway.

This story shows perfectly what almost every company has rules against drinking while on the clock. He is lucky that he didn’t get hurt.

Check out what the people in the comments on Reddit have to say about this story.

Everyone was having a good time.

Apparently drinking is common for Ukrainian people.

The captain was very hospitable.

Here is someone who has been on similar ships.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a restaurant employee who decided to put the staff over customers despite the official policy.

This Vodka can be dangerous.

If he would have stopped at one, he would have been ok. Of course, that wouldn’t have made for nearly as good a story.

Sometimes you have to enjoy yourself, and as long as you don’t get fired for it, all is well.