Subic Bay Launches Crew Change Protocol

September 11 ------ Subic Bay Freeport inaugurated a new crew transfer protocol, providing one more location for seafarers to embark and disembark as the crew change crisis continues on. Subic Bay's new operation will supplement the crew change process at nearby Manila, relieving some of the congestion with a second site.

Five Filipino crewmembers of the LNG carrier Dapeng Star were the first to take advantage of Subic's crew change process. Just off the port, they boarded a tug carrying officials from the Philippine Coast Guard and the Maritime Industry Authority, who gave them a health checkup and provided them with PPE. When they reached the pier, they boarded a van and headed to Subic's airport for a PCR test, according to Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) chairman Wilma T. Eisma. After the test, they took another van to the Manila Grand Opera Hotel, where they will be quarantined for 14 days. End-to-end, the evolution took about three hours, Eisma said - far less time that the crewmembers had spent on board. “With the start of crew-change operations here, Subic becomes a part of the solution to this global problem,” Eisma told the Business Mirror.

Source: maritime-executive.com