Meet the Master River Boat Pilot Who Conquers the Mississippi Every Day

May 19, 2021 9:35 AM

"It’s winter on the Mississippi River, one of the busiest and most dangerous waterways in the world. Over the past two days, Captain Jared Austin has transported 300,000 barrels of jet fuel on a tanker headed for Europe and fifty thousand tons of corn on a freighter en route to Brazil. Austin is certified to pilot ships between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, Louisiana. It’s his responsibility to know every bend of the river, and how its mood shifts, depending on the weather." Lara Naughton writes about shipping on the Mississippi for Narratively (from 2017).
posted by dellsolace (6 comments total)

Oh, I love me an industrial transport story.

Related, Tight-Assed River by the legendary John McPhee. (from the New Yorker, archive.org option here)

McPhee also wrote about the Mississippi and Atchafalaya Rivers in The Control of Nature back in the '80s. (archive.org link to the original New Yorker article here)
posted by sockshaveholes at 10:05 AM on May 19, 2021 [4 favorites]

Then there are the guys in canoes – adventure seekers. Captain Austin good-humoredly calls them “rocket scientists.” Like Twain, he loves the concept of life on the river. It’s romantic and beautiful. But while navigating from the bridge deck, a hundred feet above the water, a fourteen-foot kayak looks like a speck of dust. “Can you see a bug before it hits your windshield?” he asks, rhetorically. “Not only can I not see him, I wouldn’t feel him if we did make contact.”

When I was in the Boy Scouts, it would just blow my tween mind that I could theoretically take a canoe from the sleepy little Wisconsin rivers that we paddled on all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico, given time and grub. Good thing that I was a bit less adventurous than I fancied being.
posted by Halloween Jack at 10:48 AM on May 19, 2021 [1 favorite]

What a great article. I had heard about river pilots but never actually read about what their job entails. Thanks for the post!
posted by sundrop at 11:05 AM on May 19, 2021

I love things like this.

We have so much amazing modern technology, but we also still have to just haul stuff up and down a river.
posted by freakazoid at 11:28 AM on May 19, 2021

Reading this reminded me of McPhee as well- similar feel.
A good story told well.
posted by MtDewd at 11:47 AM on May 19, 2021 [1 favorite]

Looking for a Ship is another terrific mcphee title. about merchant sailors. a bit dated is all.
posted by j_curiouser at 7:18 PM on May 19, 2021