On a man-made lake in the Hunter region marine pilots practice their skills on a scaled-down model of a bustling harbour.
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00:00 On the average day in Newcastle, you can come face to face with bulk carriers.
00:07 And the people tasked with navigating them through the bustling harbour are marine pilots.
00:15 While they're used to operating ships 300 metres long and 50 metres wide, it's on a
00:21 man-made lake in the Hunter region where pilots can really put their skills to the test.
00:26 So what we've got here is a freshwater lake that has been built from scratch to recreate
00:36 what we see when say we're approaching a port.
00:40 Even the tugboat's a miniature.
00:42 So you can see there something that was 230 metres, which in real life is actually the
00:48 full length of the far side of our dam there.
00:51 The Port Ash training facility is the only place in the southern hemisphere where marine
00:55 pilots can practice their skills away from the harbour itself.
01:00 It's the brainchild of former marine pilot Andrew Beasley and his father Cliff.
01:04 I guess it's a combination of our professional marine pilot careers blended with our, what
01:11 was a radio-controlled model boat hobby that's turned into something far larger now and far
01:17 more complicated.
01:18 The other thing we can do which is quite interesting is that the facilitator in the vessel can
01:24 actually throw in faults into the ship as the students are proceeding.
01:30 So you might lose your rudder, you might lose an engine.
01:33 Port Ash is a scaled down version of Newcastle Harbour, but the conditions can be changed
01:38 to copy other ports, making it the perfect training ground for marine pilots from around
01:43 the world.
01:44 Well we can at times configure areas depending on say a particular port may be laid out and
01:52 we can actually replicate that port scale down 25 times in certain locations of the
01:58 lake facility depending on water depth.
02:01 We can also simulate current effect in our channel as well.
02:04 And these are all things that are part of the day to day ship handling of vessels in
02:10 confined waters that we try to accurately replicate.
02:15 According to the Port of Newcastle, marine pilots are responsible for bringing 71 billion
02:20 dollars worth of trade through this harbour each year.
02:23 So training on a miniature scale is vital to keeping Australia's economy going on a
02:28 larger scale.
02:29 [BLANK_AUDIO]