Well, we made it through our first Annual Review. One down, five to go! The OSU team did a great job preparing and organizing (I’m talking about you Hannah!) and it went pretty well. There were no real surprises anyway. And the warts we knew about were the warts we presented. On the technical side, the warts included the delay caused by the lengthening change and the challenges GIS has faced with some of its Functional Design subcontractors. What challenges? Well let’s just say that GIS has hired quite a few engineers of their own recently and moved most of the Functional Design work in house. On the project side, it means that our Earned Value Management system has not yet been accepted, unfortunately, due to some issues with the schedule format. But like I said, none of this was a surprise and we’ve got a solid plan moving forward. We’re still on track to starting construction in November.
It was great to bring to entire team together in Corvallis. It’s been quite a while since we’ve done that and I’m not sure when, and even if, we’ll do it again, unfortunately. Future annual reviews will be at the shipyard. I’m always really impressed with the talent we have on our team–all around. I mean the Shipyard managers from GIS, the NSF officers, OSU’s financial support, and our team at the shipyard. Lot’s of talent. Here’s a picture we took with some of the team. Unfortunately, we were having such a great time, we forgot to take a picture with everyone while we were still all together.
On the technical side, if you’ve been following our progress at all, you know that we’ve made a lot of effort to ensure that the RCRVs are going to be efficient to operate and that overall the “triple bottom line” is solid. Though laudable, this approach can create challenges, unfortunately. For example, one small way we’re increasing efficiency is by specifying LED lighting throughout the ship. This includes our external navigational lights that have very particular requirements dictated by the Coast Guard to ensure that they’re reliable and visible from predictable distances. However, LED lights, if unshielded, have been found to interfere with VHF communications, as announced this last week. Fortunately, we’ve known about this issue having looked into upgrading our Nav lights on Oceanus several years ago, and have required shielding in our RCRV specifications. I mention it here as an on going example of the type of “gotchas” that can sneak up on you and why we monitor the industry for the latest and greatest to ensure we’re ahead of the game. One of these days, don’t be surprised if I come on here and write about how one of these “gotchas” actually “gottus.”
One more quick announcement. I’m very pleased to announce that the project’s very own Shipyard Representative, John Comar, has been selected as OSU’s “Exemplary Employee of the Year” for 2017. CEOAS Dean Roberta Marinelli presented him with this honor during the Annual Review this past week. Well done, John! Very well deserved!
Ok. Until next time, thanks again for reading. Enjoy your last week of summer. And, as always, feel free to subscribe using the link above. /d
Congratulations, John!