America's Port Blog - National Geographic Channel

Cameras - A Poem by a Port Pilot

americas-port — Thu, 22 May 2008 21:58:03 +0000

Michael Rubino

Chief Port Pilot

It began with a phone call. Can you help please?
National Geographic wants to ride the high seas.
There’re shooting a reality piece, Los Angeles “America’s Port”
The focus, life on the waterfront, bring ‘em on was the retort.

The advance team arrived on a bright and sunny morn
Scouting for locations that would define the norm
Of pilots, cops, and longies, Geraldine too
Nothing would be spared from the camera’s view

From initial meeting we saw this was a change
Not a quick trip as usual it seemed a bit strange.
To have the cameras rolling at Thanksgiving meal
The friends and family asking, “What’s the deal?”

It’s not easy filling an eight-hour slot
So donning chef’s hat I grabbed the nearest pot
Carving the turkey was certainly a treat
Standing orders given to save the dark meat

Had to pull out the stops to make this dog hunt
Original Productions was rarely forced to punt
Many “oh-dark thirty” boardings were required to get it right
Despite the mundane assignments and that blasted camera light

Next it was time to film the crane ship
Special meetings, measurements didn’t want to hit
The Vincent Thomas Bridge that stood in the way
There were 20 cameras shooting the drama that day!

Through it all the cameras rarely ever missed a shot
The mic caught it all though we wished it would not
The camera was steady and always set
It was all coming together the deadline would be met

So how to create drama for an eight-hour piece
Moving ships is a job that will never cease
The show will go on for the public eye to see
“America’s Port” is ready for prime time TV

Half way around the world in a sneaker

admin — Thu, 15 May 2008 21:26:14 +0000

Molly Mayock

Series Producer

The top products arriving at the Port of Los Angeles are:
(1) furniture;
(2) apparel;
(3) vehicle and vehicle parts;
(4) toys and sporting goods;
(5) electronic products.

The majority of these products are manufactured at factories in China. That’s why we decided to go to the Nike factory in Gaobu and follow a sneaker coming off the assembly line on its journey to the store shelf in the United States.

Going to China was the trip of a lifetime. We flew into Hong Kong, traveled on a train to the bustling city of Guangzhou in mainland China and then motored a few hours to the factory in a rural area. (I was pleasantly surprised when every area I visited carried the National Geographic Channel!)

After being loaded into a cargo container, the sneaker was trucked to the Port of Hong Kong, which is one of the busiest ports in the world. It’s a vibrant, wild place full of colorful characters. We met a 50-ish woman who’d been working on the same water taxi at the port since she was 12. She drove our camera crew right along side a massive cargo ship as it was being loaded with sneakers from the Nike factory.

Watching a sneaker being made was utterly fascinating—at least 200 hands are involved in making each pair. Most of the workers were teenage girls wearing fashionable western-styled clothing (probably made in China). The factory itself was bigger, brighter and more modern than I had imagined it would be. Except for the bathroom facilities–which consisted of a hole in the floor.

I was hesitant until I remembered an appropriate slogan: Just Do It.

Want to get a close up look of America’s Port?

admin — Tue, 13 May 2008 21:55:13 +0000

Get a firsthand look at the Port of Los Angeles on Saturday and Sunday,
May 17 & 18, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free one-hour boat tours leaving
from Ports O’ Call Village in San Pedro and Banning’s Landing in
Wilmington to commemorate World Trade Week 2008.

Bring the whole family. This place will knock your socks off! ~ And
they were probably shipped through here as well.

For more information, contact (800) 831-PORT or www.portoflosangeles.org.

New Year’s Eve in the back of a cop car

americas-port — Tue, 13 May 2008 21:51:43 +0000

Molly Mayock

Series Producer

A friend said to me, “How you ring in the New Year determines how the rest of your year will go.” Well, that doesn’t bode well for me because I spent New Year’s Eve in the back of a cop car.

Luckily, it was voluntary. I did a ride-along with Port Police Senior Lead Officer Livonis Pilitsis, who is very proud of his Greek heritage. When his patrol took us past a famous local Greek restaurant, Papdakis Taverna, we saw some of the waiters dancing outside. If that much fun was happening outside, I wanted to see what was going on inside. I wasn’t disappointed when Officer Livonis immediately started dancing with a gyrating belly dancer entertaining the capacity crowd.

Back on the streets, it was a low-key evening full of traffic stops. Until ten minutes before midnight when a distress call came over the radio. A local resident named Chuck had just gotten a cell phone message from a friend who lives on a yacht in a marina at the Port. This friend has a wife and 17-year-old daughter. On the 6-minute voice mail, Chuck heard shouting and what sounded like a boat horn honking. Then came a woman’s blood-curdling scream. Calling 911, Chuck hoped for the best but feared the worst.

Blue lights all lit up, we hightailed it from the western boundary of the port (the Pacific Ocean) over the Vincent Thomas Bridge to the eastern-most side of the Port. The scene was tense as we arrived with guns drawn at the eerily named yacht, the “Irish Wake.”

To find out what happened and how marshmallows play into the mystery, you’ll have to tune into the last episode of America’s Port on Monday, May 19th.

Lost in America’s Port

americas-port — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:12:53 +0000

While still filming at the Port, we’re simultaneously writing and editing the early episodes. I have a tremendously talented writers and editors, many of whom have worked in docu-reality for years and really know the ropes.

We’re fortunate to have a newcomer from the world of scripted television. Editor Steve Semel is his name and he’s worked on a tiny little show you might have heard of… Lost.

Here are Steve’s early observations about working in an entirely new genre (as he holds the aerial photo of the Port upside down below.)

I’ve worked as an editor on a pretty wide variety of projects: movies, network television shows, pilots-–but never on a non-fiction series like America’s Port. Most recently I worked on the ABC series LOST, which, like everything else shot from a script, has been shut down by the Writers’ Guild Strike. Last year I met one of the editors of Deadliest Catch. My sons and I are fans of the show. I praised his work, he praised mine…we kept in touch with each other, and when I finished with LOST, I asked him if his company was looking for editors. To my amazement, I got a call asking me to come in for an interview.

Steve Semel

Editor

I’ve only been on the job for a week, and in that week, I’ve made two observations. The first is that everyone I’ve met connected to America’s Port believes in the project and believes in doing their best work. That makes a huge positive difference to the working environment: we’re all working and encouraging each other towards a common goal – making the best show.

The second observation is that editing a non-fiction series like America’s Port is a helluva different job than editing scripted material, and that I’ve got a lot to learn about the differences. When you’re editing footage shot from a script you’re trying to achieve the best version of the script: best performances, most deftly crafted dramatic moments, a pace that suits the material, etc. etc. When you’re editing non-fiction material there are story beats, there are objectives for the series and for your particular episode, but there’s no script to help you feel out the tone, or which characters want more screen time and which characters want less. The dramatic moments that are written into a script, set up by the director and actors, and crafted in the editing room – in non-fiction that’s all to be discovered by the writers and editors based on what happened on the day and what the camera recorded.

The editing language is very different. Yes, there are rules, but not the rules we use on a dramatic series like LOST. The work flow is different. Even the names for the same process are different. To move from the dramatic world to the non-fiction world, and I suppose the other way around – you’ve got to be up for the challenge.

The head of the port’s secret muffin recipe

americas-port — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:06:40 +0000

Molly Mayock

Series Producer

Dr. Geraldine Knatz is the Executive Director of the Port of Los Angeles. As the first female head of the number one containerport in the United States, she’s one of the most powerful movers and shakers in the shipping industry and a respected environmentalist with an undergraduate degree in zoology, master’s degree in environmental engineering and a PhD in biology. Her dual priorities, which are often at odds with one another, are to grow the Port economically while “greening” the Port environmentally.

Geraldine is also the “Energizer Bunny” of the shipping world. When she’s not traveling around the world to a United Nations conference in London or to a meeting at a port in China, this mother of two teen boys gets up everyday at 4:45 am, goes for a run with her husband, gets to work by 6 am running the port, spends her lunch hour swimming laps at a local pool, attends countless meetings and functions throughout the day and night, weekdays and weekends. (Plus she belongs to three book clubs and volunteers on historical commissions.)

People especially look forward to attending morning meetings with Geraldine because she is famous for bringing homemade goods baked from scratch by her own hands, often with ingredients she grows in her garden. I heard from several sources that her blueberry muffins have won over the gruffest of men in this traditionally male-dominated world of port “tough guys.”

Here is her recipe, including a secret ingredient she’s reluctant to let her staff in on. Her plan for not letting them find out? Give them so much work to do that they don’t have time to look at this America’s Port blog!

Dr. Geraldine Knatz’s Secret Blueberry Muffin recipe

3½ cups all purpose flour
½ cup cake flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
¼ teaspoon cardamom
2 ¼ cups fresh blueberries ( I used frozen ones when they were filming me because I could not find fresh- they were not as good)
½ pound unsalted butter softened
1 1/3 cups plus 2 Tablespoons more of superfine sugar
4 large eggs
1 Tablespoon (yes, this is right, Tablespoon) vanilla
1 teaspoon Fiori di Sicilia **
1 1/3 cups milk
Extra regular sugar for sprinkling tops of muffins before you bake them.

Preheat over to 375 degrees. Grease or spray 14 jumbo muffin tins. Sift flour, cake flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg and cardamom onto a sheet of waxed paper. Toss the blueberries with a few tablespoons of the flour mixture. Cream butter, and add superfine sugar in two additions and beat for a minute after each addition. Add eggs one at a time and beat in. Add vanilla and Fiori di Sicilia. Add the flour mixture in three additions with the milk in between. Stir in blueberries. Spoon batter in muffin tins. Sprinkle tops with regular granulated sugar. Even though the recipe will make 14 jumbo muffins, I usually make about 10 from this (this is for port people, you know.) Bake till golden, about 25 minutes, depending on size.

**The Fiori di Sicilia is an all natural citrus and vanilla flavoring, like an extract but really strong so you don’t add as much as you do of the vanilla. It’s something I added to the recipe to make it really special. You can mail order this from King Arthur’s Flour in Norwich Vermont.

The death-defying duties of port pilots

americas-port — Tue, 06 May 2008 18:32:55 +0000

Molly Mayock

Series Producer

Picture a hippopotamus performing a graceful ballet on a dime and you get an idea of the job of a Port Pilot.

A captain of a cargo ship can sail his gigantic vessel in open seas around the world, but he’s not permitted to sail it into port and berth it at the dock. That’s the job of the Port Pilot, a specially trained “valet parker” who sails out to the freighter and takes the “con” (control) of the ship to bring that hippo on home into the harbor.

“This isn’t supposed to happen in October,” said Captain John Arndt, a veteran Port Pilot, as we headed three miles out in a tiny boat to meet two freighters arriving from China.

The infamous Jacob’s Ladder

What wasn’t supposed to be happening? Howling 40 mile-per-hour winds and 10-foot swells. There was one swell that was anything but. It induced a double-whammy stomach lurch of epic proportions. Going 10 feet straight up into a wave is pretty exhilarating if you can disconnect your heart from your stomach. After being suspended momentarily in mid-air, we slammed 10-feet down into the depths of what the crew members call “the hole.”

When we arrived along side of the first container ship, an enormous vessel spanning more than three football fields long and 15-stories tall, I learned that Chief Pilot Michael Rubino expected me to climb up the side of the ship after him so I could watch him take over the helm and valet park it at its dock. In his 22-year career at the Port of Los Angeles, he’d already done this 7,000 times before.

Tagging along for number 7,001 would have required me to leap off our lurching boat and grab hold of a long rope ladder hanging down the side of this freighter that was zipping along in high winds and choppy seas. I assumed the freighter would put on the brakes and stop to let the pilot (and me) climb on. Ohhhh nooooo. The freighter never stops. Which means our small boat had to keep moving to stay apace with the “Jacob’s ladder.”

As a reporter and producer, I’ve relished assignments with built-in action verbs. I’ve climbed bridges, chased fugitives and ridden on the back of Robby Knievel’s motorcycle during a test run of his Grand Canyon jump. I definitely have a daredevil gene in my DNA, but not a death wish gene.

I’m told that an average of four port pilots die every year from falling. My first time leaping onto a moving ladder and scaling a cargo ship wasn’t going to happen under seasonally freakish conditions. I envisioned the first sentence of my obituary as: “This isn’t supposed to happen in October.”

Chief Pilot Rubino leaped from the pilot boat onto the freighter’s rope ladder and scooted up with the ease of Spiderman, but without the safety net. My Spidey sense told me to play the wuss card and stay behind. Which is exactly what I did. We sailed farther out and pulled along side the other freighter. Captain Arndt successfully jumped over to that ship and climbed up amidst ferocious winds.

With both pilots safely aboard their behemoth vessels, it was time for the Pilot transport boat to head back to shore. But first we had to careen through even worsening waves and slam into more hellacious “holes.” This sealed the fate of my distressed stomach. While I christened the aft deck, Deckhand Carol Peckham held onto me so I wouldn’t fall overboard. At the same time, she held my long hair off my face. Now that’s going above and beyond the call of duty. Amazingly so.

What I am left with is an overwhelming awe of the Pilots and their boat crew. If you saw them in line at the grocery store, you’d think they were your average Joe accountant, grade school teacher or businessman. But they perform this death-defying job 24 hours a day, every day of the year, to keep our lives and the economy rolling. Just like those 10-foot swells today.

P.S. I promised Captain Rubino before shooting was over I’d climb up the “Jacob’s ladder” onto a freighter before the end of our shooting schedule. I’ll keep you posted.

Terrorism at a terminal?

americas-port — Mon, 05 May 2008 16:15:20 +0000

Molly Mayock

Series Producer

The #1 security priority at the Port of Los Angeles is counter-terrorism. Some things that happened during our production made me feel very secure. For example, on the first day of scouting, I was early for a meeting so I wandered down toward the main channel. I whipped out a small video camera and took some visual notes about things I wanted our crews to cover. Within 30 seconds of rolling the camera, a Port Police squad car approached me. I didn’t know it, but unauthorized filming is not allowed around the Port for homeland security reasons.

Once production started, we were stopped and questioned many times by numerous law enforcement agencies. On one occasion, a media-savvy officer who detained our crew shouted (to our crew’s amusement), “Put down the boom pole.” As soon as we told him we were the National Geographic crew and proved it with our credentials, he allowed shooting to resume.

Early one morning in the darkest dark before the dawn, a security guard allowed me to drive a cameramen onto a vacant berth so we could get a cool shot of a cruise ship arriving past a row of palm trees. Within seconds of my headlights appearing on the dock, a Port Police patrol boat zoomed across the harbor to investigate what the heck a car was doing on a deserted dock. As they approached, they recognized us, shouted a greeting and asked if we needed anything.

One day at the cruise ship terminal, a bomb-sniffing dog alerted on a suitcase and a subsequent x-ray showed that there might indeed be an explosive device inside.

The cruise ship terminal was immediately shut down and the main channel was closed to all ship traffic. A gigantic cargo container ship had to turn around and get out of potential harm’s way.

One interesting conversation I had about terrorism was with a visiting Israeli general who was part of a delegation of port security experts from Israel, where ports are “closed” to the public. That means their ports are exclusively used for shipping and have secure fences all around. Anyone entering must have specific security clearance. He was stunned by what it takes to secure the Port of Los Angeles, where there are beaches, marinas, restaurants, museums, cruise ships and major events that attract visitors by the thousands.

The Israeli general and his delegation were supposed to take a helicopter tour of the Port. The general refused to get in the chopper because he feared the pickup point made the delegation vulnerable to a possible RPG (rocket propelled grenade) attack from a nearby location. I was startled by the realization that few Americans probably ever have it in their mindset to worry about being the target of an RPG. The general did a security check of his own and eventually deemed it safe for the delegation to depart in the helicopter. He explained that terrorism is a daily reality in Israel and they take nothing for granted. They can’t afford to.

A rookie’s first impressions of a port

americas-port — Mon, 05 May 2008 16:12:19 +0000

On a TV crew, production assistants (a/k/a “P.A.s”) are usually young 20-somethings working their first real job. Good P.A.s never stay P.A.s for long. That was the case with Steve Robillard, who was quickly promoted to Associate Producer. It was rewarding to see how thrilled and grateful he was to be sent on so many exciting assignments, including the awesome experience of covering a ship arrival.

Steve Robillard

Production Assistant

There’s an understanding that when working for National Geographic you’re bound to learn a thing or two about the world. When I climbed aboard the herculean Svendborg Maersk cargo container ship, this couldn’t have been evinced with any more clarity.

The Svendborg was an overwhelming structure as it arrived with majestic stealth along Reservation Point. As soon as the ship docked, it instantly came alive and teemed with activity. Cranes lowered their booms. Longshoremen went aboard and worked the vessel like termites on a mound.

For something so massive, it became rather elegant on the dock. The leviathan sat with an air of mythology about it. Before going aboard, I felt a dose of inferiority; the ship had a towering presence.

What I found aboard was an assortment of interesting figures. My first contact was with two blond heads swiveling around a corner. They stared with as much confusion at me as I did them. At a closer look the pair was a man and woman–two sailors with Eastern European accents and a style that seemed straight out of the Warhol Factory. The vessel was built in ‘73… I could only assume they’ve been aboard since then. I asked them a few questions. They smiled and giggled; I wasn’t sure if out of modesty or an insecurity with English. I moved along to find what else was aboard.

Squid pro-quo

americas-port — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:44:17 +0000

I assigned field producer Roger Roddy and cameraman Amos Clarke to cover a commercial fishing boat on the hunt for squid. They sailed up the coast to Malibu, where wild fires raged. Roger and Amos had some trepidation about the duration of this assignment, but not for long.

Roger Roddy

Cameraman

Amos and I thought we got stuck w/ the worst shift possible: 24-hours on a squid boat. But we really lucked out. We sailed with some salty Sicilian fisherman aboard the St. Katherine, a purse seine boat. Somebody mentioned that today was the feast of St. Katherine but the crew didn’t know anything about that. They had other things on their minds… like catching tons of calamari.

Sundown is primetime for squid fishing. Just before dark, Captain John Dorio decided to set the net just above what may or may not be a boatload of calamari. About half an hour later the crew pulled up about four tons of calamari.

As soon as the squid went into the hold, the Italian cook, Giuseppe, grabbed a handful of squid and took them straight to the kitchen. He cleaned and lightly fried them and added them to a pasta sauce he’d been working on all day. All work stopped and became unimportant compared to this fresh calamari dinner. Fishing crew and camera crew feasted.

I’m ruined forever. Restaurant calamari will never match the fresh calamari the Sicilian fishermen cooked up for us.

Oh yeah, my cameraman Amos is allergic to calamari, so I ate his share too.