S.C. Code Regs. § 136-072 - Docking and Undocking

A. Every master of every vessel requiring state pilotage may elect to dock or undock the vessel. Alternatively, every master may employ the services of docking masters (or "docking pilots") to maneuver the vessel in or out of the dock.

B. Whenever tugs are not engaged and whenever a qualified docking master is not assigned at a vessel master's request, a state pilot may serve as docking master.

C. State pilots, whether or not employed as docking masters, will serve every vessel on board which they are embarked as pilots. Under such circumstances, their functions will be:

(1) Advise the master of a vessel if a person purporting to be a docking master or docking pilot is known as such by the pilot to be a qualified docking master.

(2) Be prepared to direct the vessel's movement whenever:

(a) A docking maneuver may be aborted, or

(b) An undocking maneuver has been completed, or

(c) A vessel's master requests the pilot's services.

(3) Provide communications services to the vessel's master with respect to the movement of other vessels.

(4) Perform the duties of bar and harbor pilot at such times and in such places whenever the safe navigation of the vessel requires, regardless of the status of tugs alongside.

(5) Whenever a qualified docking master is controlling the vessel during a docking or undocking maneuver, and a safety need is deemed to exist in the expert opinion of the State-licensed pilot, the pilot must intervene through the vessel master.

D. No state pilot on board any vessel on which he or she is serving as pilot, shall be held responsible by the Commissioners for the consequences of any unsuccessful docking or undocking maneuver whenever the master or operator has employed a docking master or has elected to dock or undock said vessel himself.

E. The state pilot and any qualified docking master, employed by the master of any vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the Commissioners, shall agree at whatever point in the vessel's docking or undocking evolution that the one shall take control of the vessel from the other. In the absence of such an agreement, the state pilot shall be required to serve as pilot and to direct the movement of every self-propelled vessel, unless otherwise relieved by the vessel's master, whenever the sole vector of motion of such vessel is the result of that vessel's own propulsion machinery and steering apparatus.

Notes

S.C. Code Regs. § 136-072

Added by State Register Volume 16, Issue No. 7, eff July 24, 1992. Amended by State Register Volume 20, Issue No. 6, Part 1, eff June 28, 1996; State Register Volume 32, Issue No. 5, eff May 23, 2008.