Occupational Issues and Expectations of Turkish Deck Cadets

Seafaring is one of the worldʹs most difficult professions. Seafarers have to face with many negative factors while they are at sea. These negative factors, makes the seafaring profession difficult to be preferred. Fatigue, stress, heavy weather conditions and lack of communication are some of these factors that affect seafarer’s occupational continuity and also make contribution to occurrence of marine accidents. Cadet is one of the seafarers who will be a navigation officer and captain in the near future. That’s why cadets have a significant role in maritime industry. Theoretical and practical training of cadets is very important. Purpose of this study was to examine deck cadets’ training conditions and difficulties they have to face with during their training period. In order to identify these difficulties, render their lives during trainings easier, and establish their expectations, questionnaire conducted with 618 deck cadets. Interviews were carried out with 3 trainers and 10 maritime companies that have substantial shares in Turkey’s maritime trade. As a result of this study identified factors that increase fatigue mostly, reduction measures have been exposed and have tried to offer solutions. This study is an advisory to improve the occupational continuity of cadets in the profession. http://www.transnav.eu the International Journal on Marine Navigation and Safety of Sea Transportation Volume 10