It was a pleasure to see the article by Brian Gauvin on standardizing nomenclature in the towing industry in the May issue of the magazine. I have been a Marine Surveyor for 31 years and it is surprising to me that no one has undertaken this project before Captain Johansson. My company has eight offices from Corpus Christi to Cape Canaveral, and the differences in terminology coming from the surveyors at the various locations is remarkable. Add to that the variances in terms in common usage in the numerous companies we deal with, even though two companies may be geographic neighbors, and we have a whole glossary of names. We aim to issue standardized reports from all our offices, but towing nomenclature has been a problem for us for years. I would hope that at some point in the not-too-distant future, the results of Captain Johansson’s commendable efforts will be published for all to refer to and learn from.
Now we have to do the same thing with inland barge construction nomenclature – but that is a story for another day.
