it’s no longer there. Where has all the equipment gone? The ‘new library’ which was dedicated by Lady Mountbatten in 1989, is a shell with all the internals destroyed and no books.


I understand that the main site has been sold off by Solent University to property developers and will be repurposed into expensive luxury apartments for people who have no knowledge of the background and history of the site.


The courses that I recently attended were carried out in a temporary two-story building on the lower site, where the ‘new workshops’ (1988) used to be. I was informed by the staff that there are works in progress to build a new training establishment there for these STCW courses and this has been delayed because of COVID; however the site at the moment is not at all inspiring. That said the staff and the quality of the STCW short courses that I attended were very good.


I understand that the current intake of Southampton cadets is embedded in mainstream Solent University life in Southampton at St Mary’s and the current intake is only around 20 per year. Many of these cadets will not get jobs with the companies that are sponsoring them through the cadetship.


There is an interesting YouTube video about the history of Warsash - see https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=vZlmLF2tkBs which takes us up to 2017. I’m not sure that there has been any positive progress since then.


Where will they get their practical seagoing experience from? Where will ‘we’ get our next generation of Superintendents and Surveyors from?


If any readers have any opinions or experience about other MN colleges, please let’s hear your news and views.


As we all know an academic qualification is no substitute for practical experience and on-the- job training.


The good news is that the MCA has been super-efficient and revalidation of my Class 1 COC was carried out within 24 hours of receiving my online application. Their normal turnaround time is two weeks. Well done to the MCA - revalidation@mcga.gov.uk. They have been very helpful in correspondence and advice on revalidation.


This brings me to our, IIMS professional qualifications, and mentoring of less experienced surveyors. It is not enough for a surveyor to ‘just’ complete a course in a surveying discipline unless he or she can use that knowledge practically to consolidate their learning and have some guidance in that process.


Using IACS governance as an example, it takes a minimum of two years for a Classification Society surveyor to achieve the minimum experience in their ‘certificates of authorization’ for them to conduct surveys without senior supervision or sign-off. During the first two


years, they are classified as ‘Supervised’ while carrying out surveys. As they progress, they will achieve ‘Un-supervised’ status for the various survey types. That is after they have joined a Class Society either as a Graduate or from a seagoing and/or industry professional background. Normally a new surveyor will have a mentor or a training supervisor, who will help and guide them to attend the necessary types of survey to allow them to develop their practical skills and experience.


In our world - non-IACS surveying - whether it be for yachts, small commercial vessels, or large commercial craft, for insurance, or on behalf of an owner, we need NO FORMAL QUALIFICATIONS or EXPERIENCE.


All ‘you’ need to call yourself a ‘surveyor’ is a client willing to pay you to carry out a particular survey.


While IIMS is the leading professional organization providing both training for surveyors and practical courses to develop skills and experience, it remains difficult for small, one-man operators, to receive mentoring and knowledge sharing from other more experienced surveyors, who have greater industry knowledge.


I open this to our members and readers to consider ‘How’ we can help mentor our fellow, less experienced surveyor members and ‘Who’ would be prepared to become a mentor. We will be discussing this further in future IIMS publications.


6 | The Report • September 2022 • Issue 101


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