Word: captain
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...form of free dog food and veterinary care. But on March 1, Police Commissioner Willie Williams eliminated the benefits of 45 wet-nosed retirees to shave $13,500 from the department's $262 million budget. "When you are looking at cutting services to the homeless," said police spokesman Captain Richard De Lise, "how can you justify feeding dogs...
...captain with too much alcohol in his blood turns over command of his tanker to an unqualified third mate. The mate shouts contradictory orders to the helmsman and eventually impales the vessel on a reef, causing millions of gallons of oil to gush from the mangled hull. Companies that boasted they had the equipment and manpower in place for a quick cleanup turn out to have hardly anything available and lose irreplaceable days getting into action. Then, almost predictably, the calm weather gives way to high winds that render their efforts ineffective...
...sense, the Valdez tragedy begins not in Alaska but on Long Island, N.Y. There, in 1985, Captain Joseph Hazelwood was convicted of drunken driving. Last September in New Hampshire, he was again found guilty of driving while intoxicated. In a five-year span, his automobile driver's license was revoked three times. Hazelwood is still not permitted to steer a car, but he retained his license to command a ship -- why, no one can satisfactorily explain. In 1985, after Hazelwood informed the company about his drinking problem, Exxon sent him to an alcohol rehabilitation program. The company says...
...tanker out of the port of Valdez. Once he had departed from the ship, Hazelwood left the bridge and went to his cabin while the vessel was still moving along the jagged shores of Prince William Sound. That was in violation of Exxon policy, which calls for the captain to keep command until the ship is on the open ocean. Hazelwood turned over the steering of the ship to Third Mate Gregory Cousins, who is not licensed by the Coast Guard to pilot a vessel through Alaskan coastal waters...
...after that? Although the pipeline law limits a company's liability to $100 million in most cases, that lid is off if a spill and the damage that results are due to negligence. A court may find that the actions of Captain Hazelwood and Third Mate Cousins -- and the failure of both Alyeska and Exxon | to respond quickly to the spill -- meet that test. Both the state of Alaska and the Federal Government have opened criminal investigations of the spill. "It will be a long war of experts," says James McNerney, a Houston specialist in environmental and maritime...