Here is my recommended song for this post.

So for this term in Planning we had to complete a job shadow.

Now since I’m really interested in Enviromental Sciences I decided to look at possible shadows in that field. I have an uncle who used to work with the Port of Vancouver (he’s at Transport Canada now) and the port has many different enviromental programs in which my uncle worked with closely. Now in Vancouver we have a lot of shipping operations going on. From that their are many boats in and around our waters. Naturally they would of course produce a lot of noise as well. Now with whales they use echolaction to find their prey and use calls to communicate with the rest of their companions (espically killer whales). So because of the huge amount of ship noise many whales in the area are struggling. That is where the port comes in. They are running a program called ECHO (Enhancing Cetacean Habitat and Observation).

So so naturally I went there to do my job shadow. My uncle got me in touch with two people on the team and we set up a day for me to come in.

I began my morning by hanging out with Melanie Knight. We went over what ECHO has done and what they are currently working on. Then I worked on some stuff with her. Recently they have been giving discounts to ships with different enviromental standards to promote green ships. There is a new innovation that is said to reduce ship noises. It is called a propeller boss cap fin. It is an attachment that goes on the fin and reduces the drag and noise emitted from the fin and engine.

So some ships have adopted these fins and the port has been giving incentives to them for it. My job was to take their data (which I’m not allowed to share) and put it into a chart to see if there is a noticeable difference/improvement compared to other ships without the fin.

During that time Melanie got a call from the people upstairs in the security room. My Uncle was a harbour master at the port and he worked with the poêle in the security room. So, he sent one of them a text and they came a grabbed my to give me a our of their offices. It was really cool. I got to see the emergency room and I even got to sit in my uncles old desk.

After checking out the security room we headed out for lunch where I met Orla. I spent a lot of time talking with Orla, getting to know her and her role in the ECHO program. She started off with the enviromental consulting side but then ventured into the ECHO program.

After lunch Orla and I headed to a conference at one of the local hotels. The conference is called GreenTech and is a place where people from all over can come and learn about different enviromental initiatives going on in the maritime industry. Of course ECHO was presenting so I got to go check it out. I sat through one presentation time slot where different people from Canada and the US talked about ship noise reduction and the different goings on in the field. BC ferries was there and even Maersk.

It was a really interesting presentation that really surprised me in that there are so many programs and initiatives going on to reduce ship noise. After that the day was done so I headed to my dads office down the street and chilled out for a little bit before returning home.

It was such a neat experience and I’m really glad I was able to do it. I learned a lot about ECHO but I also got a really good sense of the field of enviromental science and the different options out there for it. It’s definetly something that still interests me and I what to seriously consider it has a future career for me.