More than 60 Captains and Senior Crew members attended the U.S. Superyacht Association’s (USSA) 7th Annual Captains Briefing Presented by AERE Docking Solutions, IGY Marinas, Marina Port Vell, MTN Satellite Communications, National Marine Suppliers and Yacht Chandlers at the Yacht Club at Isle de Sol.
The beautiful setting of St. Maarten provided an incredible backdrop for this annual event that is a unique combination of superyacht captains and leaders in the superyacht industry.
“I’ve been involved with this event since the beginning, and this was one of the best ever,” said Vicki Abernathy, Aere Docking Solutions. “The combination of topics, speakers, location and participation was the winning ticket for my company.”
This year’s briefing covered a variety of topics that were felt to be important to Captains. Julie LIberatore of Maritime Professional Training and Michael French of International Yacht Training spoke on the STCW – Manila Amendments and the implications for the captain and crew license requirements that took effect on January 1, 2012.
This was followed by a panel discussion on How the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC) will Impact the industry, presented by Billy Smith of Trinity Yachts; Peter Southgate of the Cayman Island Registry and Gene Sweeney of the Marshall Islands Yacht Registry. While many of the Captains were aware of some of the issues involved with MLC, all were thankful for the opportunity to get more of the details first-hand.
“This event was fantastic,” said Captain Jeffrey Guymon, of the M/Y Huntress. “It is great to have this opportunity to hear this important information from such solid sources…and not the usual rumor mill.”
Donna Bradbury of BWA Yachting and Laura Conway of the US State Department, rounded out the informative afternoon with a session on Entering US Waters followed by a Q&A period.
“There were a number of important take-away U.S. Entry and MLC issues that were identified by the attending Captains that we will be following up on,” said Kristi Hebert of Ward’s Marine. “That is the benefit of these Briefings as we get to hear first-hand the challenges that Captains face when entering the United States and hopefully are able to do something about it.”
This event proved to be not only informative for the Captains and Senior Officers, but the cocktail parties offered a great opportunity to network with industry leaders. This year the number of USSA members doubled and most participants walked away with leads that made the trip a good business decision.
“The opportunity to spend time with Captains in a social setting made the trip a huge success for me,” said John Smundin of Palm Harbor Marina. “I’ll definitely be back next year.”
Special thanks to IGY’s Yacht Club at Isle de Sol, Yacht Chandlers and the Castaways Bar for their tremendous support of this event.
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February 1, 2012 6:42 pm | 
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