Funing II

Sister of the ship Erawan

History
Aug 1978. Delivered to Taikoo Navigation Co. Hong Kong, and operated by CNCo.

Jan 1982. Sold to the Peoples Republic of China. Renamed "Pin Jiang".

2007. Renamrd "Zheng Yang"

2008. Broken up in China.

Events / Stories
The "Funing", under the command of Chris Ennion with Steve Barber as Mate, got herself into that rare thing in CNCo, a first class bust up, ending in arbitration, over the charter party.

She had been fixed for a year to Atalanta Maritime of Monaco who sublet her to Rhea, Augsburg, who loaded her with cement at Rostock for Nigeria, but who forgot to pay hire after the first couple of instalments. Atlanta claimed they had a lien on the cargo; we pointed out that they did not (the "Aegnoussiotis" and the "Aghios Georgios" cases) and, after the customary weeks swinging round the anchor, proceeded to discharge the cargo. Atalanta treated this as repudiatory breach and threatened to arrest the Ocean Youth Club ketch "TAIKOO". On completion of discharge we found ourselves charter free; Jimmy Lough asked the Elder Dempster agent in Warri if there was any prospect of a cargo out and recieved the memorable reply, "NIL ZERO ZILCH CHANCE ANY CARGO OUT", so we ballasted back to the North Sea. The "Funing"'s arrival coincided with the start of the arbitration so Steve Barber paid off and attended as CNCo's witness, which was a bit of a non-event as the charterers conceded on the first morning of the hearing and paid up in full, leaving Messrs Barber, Craig-Bennett and Hughes-Hallett to enjoy a celebration dinner hosted by JHH at the RAC.

One oddity of the "Funing" was that the escape from the Master's cabin, which in SD 14's consists of welded rungs outside the accomodation block leading down from an opening window, led down from the wrong window, which did not open. But on the whole she was reckoned, as a Mark V, to be a very advanced SD14 indeed, with UMS!