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July 9, 2024 74 mins
Kramer Whitelaw works as a deckhand with McAllister Towing in the Baltimore Harbor. In March, Merchant Vessel Dali slammed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, causing it to collapse and close marine traffic in one of the busiest ports in the country.

Whitelaw, a former wrestler at George Mason University and McDonogh School in Maryland and a current assistant high school wrestling coach, was part of the clean up crew and talks about the experience from a work perspective, from a perspective of being a former wrestler and as that of a Baltimore native.

 
Whitelaw is still actively involved in the sport as a coach, but given his role with the company, he’s had to step back some, but still finds time to coach with former high school teammate Brynn Holmes at Gilman School and this week, is on the U20 Pan Am coaching staff for Team USA in Peru.

The updated Mat Talk Online Fargo Almanac is now available. Get yours today with every juicy nugget of Fargo history you can shake a stick at mattalkonline.com/fargo

Want an ad-free version of the show? Hit up the Patreon link at patreon.com/mattalkonline to contribute and get your own ad-free RSS feed for (most of) the shows on the Mat Talk Podcast Network.
 
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Short Time Wrestling Podcast: Episode 754 – Recorded July 3, 2024
Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Whoa hey, Welcome back again,wrestling fans. It's the Short Time Wrestling
Podcast. I am your host,Hall of Fame wrestling writer, broadcaster and
announcer Jason Bryant, and today onthe show, going to talk to Kramer

(00:23):
Whitelaw. He was a George Masonwrestler from Maryland. Wrestled at McDonagh School
in high school. Now an assistantcoach at Gilman School. And as I
record the intro here, we recordedthis about six days ago. But if
this is the second week in July, right before Fargo, as you're getting
into this, Kramer is currently onthe U twenty pan Am coaching staff down
in Peru with Team USA. Krameralso was part of the cleanup at the

(00:50):
Key Bridge. The MV Dolly slammedinto the Key Bridge in March. It
collapsed, and Kramer, being aBaltimore guy, has a lot of stories
of about what that bridge means tohim. Those of you that grew up
in that region know that the KeyBridge is an iconic fixture across Baltimore Harbor
and it's something that it's now gone. But the story here is Kramer was

(01:11):
a wrestler that's on that crew withwith McCallister Towing, and he tells the
story from his perspective on the cleanup, how he got into the industry,
his background wrestling, his background coaching, and what he's doing now in terms
of both wrestling, coaching and workingwith this company in the maritime industry also,

(01:33):
and you know, we talk aboutindustries that are perfect for wrestlers,
and Kramer makes the pitch here forwrestlers in this maritime industry that you know,
being uncomfortable is what wrestlers are doing. You know, it's what you've
done your entire life. You're you'reputting uncomfortable positions on the mat, You're
putting uncomfortable positions in making weight andmanaging your body, managing everything about the

(01:55):
sport it is. It is tough. I mean it's it's a tough sport.
And here's an industry that's pretty muchgeared for tough people. So you've
got the military, you've got someother types of industries that are really geared
towards hard work and determination and beingable to be gritty and fight through things.
And Kramer explains that with this industry. So sit back, relax,

(02:17):
enjoy this interview. But first itis a week prior to Fargo. I'm
shipping out for my twenty fifth consecutiveJunior National Championship. Been to every single
one since two thousand, actually,no, since nineteen ninety nine. I
started going to this tournament almost nineteenyears old, and I'm about to turn
forty five. Holy crap, whatI've got with it is since then,

(02:38):
I have produced the Fargo Almanac,which you can get at matt talkonline dot
com slash fargo for forty bucks.It is a arsenal of results, information,
placements, state fact stats figures.If you've probably thought about what if
this, or when was the lasttime that out the Junior Nationals, the

(03:00):
Junior and what we used to callCadets the sixteen Nationals, I've probably got
it, and if I don't haveit, let me know see if I
can probably add it to the bookin the future. But I added thirty
seven new pages to this thing thisyear. And you can get this as
a one off at mattalk online dotcom slash fargo, or you can be
part of the team here and contributevia Patreon at mattalk online dot com,

(03:24):
slash contribute and hit the Patreon linkand you get that, you get the
D one preview Guide, you getthe newsletter, you get some perks you
get you know, depending on howmuch you contribute per month, you can
get a draft class T shirt,stickers, all sorts of cool stuff.
You know, mine melds and ideasthat I just I throw to the wall
and you get them. So youwant to get that guide. You want

(03:46):
to get that almanac. You wantto get the stats, facts and figures.
You want to get all sorts ofstuff to kind of make you a
little bit more of an informed wrestlingfan. Hey, Matt talk oneline dot
com, slash contribute. It givesyou something and it supports the work that
I do here nobody else is payingfor. So you want to help out
and you want to say thanks.That's the way to do at mattokwonline dot
com slash contribute. But right now, it's Fargo time with a guy I

(04:10):
met his dad in Fargo. Iwatched Kramer Place in Fargo back in two
thousand and six. It's Kramer Whitelawand McAllister towing as he helps repair the
wounds from the keybridge collapse. Asalways, would like to thank you for
spending your time with me because you'vealways got time for short time. Whoa,
it's a short time wrestling podcast comingat you and an early morning recording

(04:32):
here in the wonderful state of NewBrighton, Minnesota. I'm your host,
Hall of Fame wrestling writer, broadcasterand announcer Jason Brian. Today we're heading
back to the land of seafood,the Chesapeake Bay, Old Bay, seasoning,
whatever you want to say. KramerWhitelaw on the show, going to
be talking a little bit about hiscareer as a wrestler, but what he's
doing now and what that's been likein the world of current events, because

(04:55):
there's some things that happened in theBaltimore Harbor recently, maybe this bridge that
fell down. Kramer is actually activelyinvolved in the clean up process. Well,
that will get into details on that. But first of all, it's
been a while, man, ithas been a long long time. How
has it been for you recently?And you know, how's life treating you?
Life is good. Life is good. So still you know, living

(05:15):
here in the land of pleasant livingin Baltimore. So coach wrestling, trying
to stay busy, always push myselfa little bit, but no, life
is life is good. So finallyfound a missus to spend some time with,
and so kind of checking all theboxes in life and things are going

(05:35):
well. You tend to find yougrow up once you get married. I
learned that I didn't turn I jokedthat. Actually we were talking before about
life in my twenties, and Ifound out I didn't grow up until I
was about twenty nine years old.So anything that happened before I got married
is a different era. Are youfinding like the moving into marriage that adulthood
has become a little bit more like, Okay, this is this isn't as

(05:58):
this isn't so bad. My parentsaren't as uptight as I thought they might
have been when I was a kid. Yeah, you know, you and
I kind of chat a little bitbefore we started recording that. You know,
my parents actually live with me now. We live under the same rooms
in the apartment at my house,and we hang all the time. You
know, we we we're kind ofbest friends. Now. If it's a
Saturday morning and I'm not getting breakfastat the local diner with my mom and

(06:21):
dad, there's there's normally a problem. So it's great, you know,
it's you know, wrestling for yearsand years. You know, you always
try to look at the white lessonsthat it teach you and how it helps
you mature as an individual, andreally really been the case. And much

(06:41):
like you said, I don't thinkI really matured and became an adult until
maybe thirty thirty one for me,a couple of years after you. But
it's been it's been great. Youknow. I'm thirty thirty three now and
we'll be we'll be thirty four thiscoming year, and I feel like I'm
just hitting my stride. So it'sa great place to be. Well,

(07:03):
I did say it instantaneously happened.I met my wife at twenty nine.
I'm still working on the whole maturitything now, the parenthood thing, that
is another thing that I'm going toI still struggle with. I got a
twelve year old and almost eight yearold, so it's like I'm still working
through that part of it. Butgoing back on your career, your three
time National Prep place winner at McDonaldSchool, a program that's got a lot

(07:27):
of tradition, you know, oneof those stalwart programs there in the state
of Maryland in the private school sectorand as well as at the national prep
level. Cop Pete Welsh has donea great job. We've seen you guys
at the Virginia Dules. You guyshave been nationally ranked. What was it
like wrestling for Coach Welsh and comingthrough that program a time in my life
that I can look back and sayreally shaped me into the person that I
am most importantly now and definitely thewrestler, and even more so now the

(07:51):
coach than I am at I've expressedso much gratitude to Coach Welsh. We
still speak regularly now. He's reallygetting into boating, so he'll occasionally call
me if he's out on the boat, if he needs some advice or something
like that. But he's really alwayskind of been a strong figure in my

(08:13):
life, a second father, youknow, the kind of guy that if
I have any questions, concerns andneed an opinion, needs some help,
call them right away. You know, I met Coach Welsh when I was
seven eight years old at McDonald's wrestlingcamp, and I came home from camp
after the first day or two andtold my parents I'm going to go to

(08:37):
school there one day because I wantto wrestle for Coach Welsh. And you
know, fortunately I had the opportunitywhen I was twelve to go there the
following year start at mcdona as aneighth grader. And you know, obviously
the school is tremendous, the facilitiesare tremendous, the faculty staffed. But
for one thing that attracted into theschool right away was coach Welsh just he's

(09:00):
done a phenomenal job. He is, uh, just a great coach,
but more than anything, just agreat human being and the kind of guy
that every one of his athletes wantswants to be when when they're in that
position later in life. Yeah,the opportunity there, you placed in Fargo.
We're coming up on Fargo here ina couple of weeks. You've been
on that staff. You've been workingwith the State Association for a while.

(09:22):
You're alluded to your time as highschool coach. You're coaching a a arrival
of McDonald or you were coaching coachingat Gilman School, which actually is the
alma mater of One Rock Harrison.So, uh, you're you stayed in
the prep ranks and uh, youknow what was it like to to get
get on get on the coaching sideof things and then uh, then stare
across the mat at your at yourmentor there. Yes, you know,

(09:45):
I had always been told that Ihad maybe a natural knack for coaching,
uh, even when I was inthe high school working with some of our
younger elementary school and uh and middleschool kids. So it had always been
interested me. You know, Iactually kind of got my started to dip
my toes in the water with coachingat McDonough after college, helping them with

(10:09):
their high school program, while whileMiles Martin was there kind of just became
his personal dummy to get beat upall the time. And from there really
decided that coaching was a huge partof my life and I wanted to continue
to make it a huge part ofmy life. I even went to the
extent of opening my own wrestling facilityhere in Baltimore a few years back,

(10:35):
Brown Control Wrestling Academy. I openedit in affiliation with Brown Control Academy,
which is a group of gyms inBaltimore and the surrounding area run by John
Rallow kind of the uh the godfatherof mixed martial arts and jiu jitsu here
in Baltimore, and did that fulltime for a long time, and uh,

(10:56):
you know, Unfortunately wrestling doesn't paythe bills. As far as coaching
goes, you know, you haveto have some secondary income at the very
least or primary income and then coachingand yeah, and uh so I had
to learn how to transition and howto find the best opportunities for me to

(11:18):
be able to continue to coach whilealso having you. And it is flexible
enough or at least some bosses thatare understandable enough to uh to let you
pop out early to get to practiceor you know, make make some evening
matches. But it's been great.You know, I've been over at Gilman

(11:41):
for I think this was my fourthseason over there. I coached with Bryn
Holmes. Brinn is the head coachover there. Brinn was a few time
national two time national prep champion,I think at right even batter lacrosse player.
So uh, you know, we'vewe've got some funny stories about him

(12:01):
winning preps and uh Buxton coming upto him afterwards and being in disbelief that
he was not going to be acollege wrestler, that he was going to
play with cross. But uh,you know, just a great guy,
great family man. Again, surroundyourself by the people that you. You
know that people that have common goalsand common vision as you and uh,

(12:24):
So I had kind of popped arounda little bit, a little bit of
a nomad with some with some programsup here in Baltimore. I coached at
my local local high school, sparsPoint where where I live, coach at
Saint Paul's a little bit with CoachEider, Coach rob Ider. Back when
we had the likes of you know, Kurt mckenry and Will Breeda, kim

(12:48):
ron Her, we had some reallytalented kids and uh, now just kind
of feel like I really found homeat Gilman. Brenda and I have a
great time. Yeah. We wecomp ment each other very well. His
attention to detail with with all aspectsof the program and uh kind of me
with my abilities with teaching technique,and uh our mutual abilities to motivate and

(13:13):
uh and really kind of goog thebest out of these kids. So it's
been great. It was a littleweird, uh for a little bit coaching
against mcdonnaugh, you know, alittle it's a little bit of sweet for
the last few years when we startedwinning. You know, their very long
tradition between mcdonna and Gilman and ourfirst year there, they blanked us in

(13:37):
our duels and uh didn't even throwus a scrap And uh, I think
that motivated Brett and I to getin and work harder and start finding the
right group of kids to come inthere and be successful. And it all
kind of culminated this past year.We uh, you know, we won
our m Double A division in thedual meet championship, We won the tournament

(14:00):
championship, and we won the Independentschool state title as well, and finished
the year with number one state rankingfor the team. And it's been uh,
it's been great. I mean,there's no one that deserves it more
than brid It's just such a hardworking and great guy. And I think
he's been at the Helm at Gilmannow for fourteen fifteen years and has had

(14:22):
some tough years, you know,where he's getting blanked for a lot of
school and not making the trip tonational preps because there's no qualifiers. And
you know, this year we hadour first national PEP Prep finalist I think
since two thousand and one, twothousand and two, something like that.
So an old name for you,Mike Faust was yeah, our first national

(14:48):
national prep champion. Yeah, beforethe two point fifteen era. That's how
long it was because Maryland was oneof the last states to adopt it.
Yeah, because actually this is thesecond straight is it the second straight show?
It's to last two or three showsWe've had a Mike Foust reference because
the previous one of the previous shows, I was talking to somebody about Tom
Lawler, who wrestled. He wasin the MMA, he wrestled at Central

(15:11):
Florida in the in the n CWA, but actually wrestled Faust at the Carolina
Open. I remember watching this facelike what's this club guy doing in the
overtime with Mike Foulest when Foust wasin Virginia Tech. Yeah, and the
joke is with Foules Foust, Ithink he texted me year or email me
years whatever. Back when we hadINSTI mentions like, hey, do I
have the record for most minutes wrestled? Ever? He might in the modern

(15:33):
era because uh yeah, I meanI don't know if it was who was
in overtime more Mike Fouster, JohnLockhart. There's there's a question about that
anyway. So before we get toyour coach, Greg talking a little bit
about going to college, wrestled forcoach Mark Wheeter at George Mason and Fairfax,
And I look at the world ofcollege wrestling and we look at the

(15:56):
wrestlers who come through programs. Ihate to use the term mid may,
but that is what people are callingit. So George Mason mid major program
in the CAAA, we were talkingearlier that they were, you know,
the teams we battled with when Iwas in school at that place in Norfolk,
and looking around at your teammates,then those are the guys that you
know, you get into business,you get into the app jobs, but

(16:18):
it's your programs like George Mason thatare putting the high school coaches out there
the passion for the sport. Likemy announcing partner Brian Hazzard wrestled at George
Mason, coach for you know,twenty plus years at Robinson. So when
you look at your time at Masonand your time as a college wrestler,
how much did that really just helpyou appreciate the sport or maybe change your
focus, like, yeah, Ican give back more to the sports as

(16:42):
a coach, then you know,maybe maybe my career goals didn't happen to
be what they were, but youknow, you find a different passion for
the sport. Yeah, for sure. No, And honestly, my college
experience did not go as well asI anticipated. And now, in hindsight,

(17:02):
I look back at my time atMason at it was a time in
my life where I kind of questionedhow much I love the sport. It's
uh, Division one wrestling is notfor everyone, and it's no matter where
you are, it's a neat grinder. There's a ton of time that you

(17:22):
dedicate to it. You know,for me personally, it was a very
expensive experience. I was a seventeenyear old kid that made a decision that
was going to affect me for thenext four or five years of my life
and was going to end up,you know, costing me more than what

(17:45):
most people pay for their first home, what my parents way more than what
my parents paid for their first AndI've view that experience now as a really
great model for the athletes that Ithat I coach now, the ones that
are going through the college and provingprocess. It's easy for me to kind

(18:08):
of ask the difficult questions to alot of my kids, maybe the questions
that some other adults aren't asking themor other coaches are people in their life
just to help them make the rightdecisions and end up in the right place.
You know. Not to say thatGeorge Mason was not the right place
for me. Again, I've takenso much from that experience, but as

(18:32):
a young guy coming out of college, a lot of considerable amount of debt,
how am I going to pay thisback? And more than anything,
you know, probably what what itcost me intuition there I gained in my
h in my experience for life,and my ability to help mold some better
decisions for for some other kids downthe road. But I loved my time

(18:56):
at George Mason. You know.I'm still still talk to some of the
guys that I wrestled with down there. I've got a wedding coming up this
year for for one of my formerdrill partners there, Maurice Fleming from Maryland,
who was my roommate there. Wewere in the same recruiting class.

(19:17):
He's still heavily involved with coaching herein Maryland. And probably the guy that
I deal with the most was BrandonBooker. So he's an NCAA qualifier and
now he's the head coach at HersheyHigh School up in PA. He would
he from Northern, right, Isthat right? Northern High School? I
know, I don't think he's aCV. I don't think he's a Coverland
Valley guy. I think he wasa Northern guy. No, I don't

(19:40):
think he was a Cover of theValley guy. But he went back.
I think he was coaching at CentralDolphin for a little bit. And now
he took the reinservert Hershey and wewe were just on the phone the other
day. We're both crazy about fishing. We won a big fishing tournament a
few years ago together. He hadn'tseen each other in a couple of years,

(20:00):
and he called me looking to filla spot and uh he ended up
filling out and winning this event.And uh so it's you know, I'm
always so blessed by the sport ofwrestling, the people that had brought into
my life, the people it continuesto bring into my life, but also
the people that is kept in mylife. And you know, Brandon's one

(20:21):
of those guys that we we pickup where we left off every single time.
And you know, it's one ofthose special people from my George Mason
experience that that again makes me knowthat in the moment it may not have
been the most fulfilling experience for me. In the long run, I'm incredibly
grateful for for my time there.Uh, even you know, coach Leader,

(20:47):
it's been great being with him now, seeing him at events. Huge
fan of his son Ben. Uh. He is just such a tough kid.
Uh. He works so hard,wears his heart on this lead every
single match. So it's been greatbeing able to be but definitely on the
side of that route nam one withwith coach Eder now after remember remembering Ben

(21:11):
as a as an infant at mytime there. So but yeah, you
know, awesome to see what ishappening there now with Coach Beasley, you
know, especially they're kind of upbraidingthe coaching staff or attempting to you know,
they brought Dean Hyle, So it'sexciting proud to tell people that,
uh, you know, I wrestledat George Mason, especially with where the

(21:36):
with the program is continuing to go. You know, I still wear my
Mason stuff around all the time.I'm heading to Peru next week. I'll
be packing up my George Mason wrestlingshirt to be wearing down there at some
point in time. So it's youknow, great program, phenomenal school,
and I think the future is rightfor them. I think they'll continue to
climb and you know, maybe getout of mid range mark here in the

(21:59):
next you know, five ten years, I think I think they'll continue to
move up and you know, bebe a contender for one of the better
programs and in you know, themid Atlantic and in the notts of distant
future. One thing you talked aboutthere is is just like making those decisions.
And I'm catching a little bit ofa hint that you're looking at when
these kids make decisions. Now you'reyou're it's not D one or bus.

(22:23):
It's like, Okay, there's there'sgood Division two programs out there. There's
there are granted Division three is nonathletic scholarship, but there's a lot of
creative financial aid these Division three schools. You can go to an expensive Division
three school, but you get agreat financial package and you come out not
paying a whole lot. And withthe kids that you guys have at Gilman,
you're typically looking i'd say a slightlylittle bit more of you know when

(22:47):
you look at the fast but they'renot checking all the lower income boxes.
As you would some of the otherplaces in the area. So it's like
you've got a different type of studentyou're funneling the college. So with the
abundance of now over one hundred andtwenty two Vision three schools, a lot
of them being uh in the southeastand the Northeast, they're growing. Is
that kind of where I'm seeing isyou're kind of maybe looking at telling kids,

(23:07):
hey, there are more than justD one options out there to have
a good college experience. Absolutely,you know, I I tell everyone,
you know, all my athletes andtheir parents now, and you know,
I still help with the recruiting processfor kids outside of Delman as well.
You know, just any any kidthat I think is a good kid,
I'm going to tell the parents,like does he want to wrestle in college?

(23:30):
All right, you know, giveme a list of schools he's interested
in. And if you don't knowwhere to start, you know, let
me, let me reach out andsend out some feelers. And you know,
I personally, during my college process, you know, I think I
looked at it as it is dWanter bus for me, and you know,
and I had D one offers andI took a lot of visits and

(23:59):
knew that Division one was definitely apossibility for me, but I never truly
looked down the road to say,you know, what would it be like
to actually have a winter break incollege and what would it be like to
to actually in the springtime have alittle bit of time off from the map.
And those are the kind of thingsthat I that I bring up to

(24:22):
my kids. Now, you knowthat guys that are maybe gung ho D
one and we start looking into Dtwo s and D three's, and you
know, those are the conversations wehave. You know, hey, you're
going to be able to have alittle bit more of a normal, normal
college experience because your your time isnot going to be fully dictated by by
you know, just the sporting kindof goes for all all divisional athletes,

(24:47):
not just wrestlers. But I've beenlucky to meet uh and have kind of
a tremendous network of coaches. Soin the last couple of years, I've
sent kids to you know, Dtwo s and D three's that were on
the maybe the cusp D one couldhave gotten into D one schools because they
are tremendous in the classroom and greatpeople and could have gotten into a Division

(25:14):
one school and walked onto the teamand probably not have been the starter for
a few years. And they havepaid their dues and and gotten into it.
And then we've had some kids thathave decided, now I'm gonna you
know what I hear what coach issaying, and let's go check this school
out, and they fall in love. You know, one of my one
of my wrestlers, ends up withWilliams right now, and that was a

(25:37):
little bit of a last minute thing. You know, he was on the
bubble for D One's wasn't true exactlywhat to do. Well, his grades
were probably pretty sharp. If you'regetting into Williams, that is no joke
academically exactly. And that's what Iexpressed to Dad. You know, he
is such a spellar student that it'syou know, why would you not go

(26:00):
into one of the top institutions inthe entire country. You know, if
if if Yale had a wrestling program, then you'd be right up there with
Harvard as as you know, asthe top schools. But Williams is not
too far behind it as far asacademics go. They don't have divisional wrestling,
but they have wrestling, the networking, just the trajectory for the rest

(26:22):
of your life. When you graduateand you have that degree and that diploma
that say, you know, Igraduated from Williams. It holds a lot
of weight and uh so, sothat's where he ended up. Ended up
picking mom and dad and he wentup for a visit, met coach Honeker,
who I think is probably the mostpassionate coach out there, and had

(26:49):
an interesting freshman campaign up there.You know, had to had to battle
a little bit, battle some injuries, figure out what college wrestling was all
about. But I'm hopeful that thatI know at the end of the day
that you know, and I tellthis for all my wrestlers. You pick
a school where if you could neverwrestle ever again, whether it was the

(27:11):
program was cut, or you hada significant injury, or you just decided
that you fell out of love withthe sport you didn't want to do it
anymore, you pick a school whereyou can see yourself even if you can't
wrestle. And and I'm pretty confidentthat I've made the correct decision or helped

(27:33):
some of my wrestlers make the correctdecision in the last few years. And
they've ended up in the right placewhere some of them have even uh,
you know, I sent a guyout to Cloud Baptist a couple of years
back with coach Derek Moore, who'salways been an inspiration for me. I
can't remember my senior year of highschool watching him win the NC double as

(27:55):
tech, following his way in inyou know, through the finals to be
a national champion as a walk.You know that, I think that motivates
the people out there. But alwaysbeen a big fan of coach More and
we sent sent Max out there,and Max decided beforego his senior year wrestling
there, but mostly because he wasout there owner r OTC scholarship and loved

(28:21):
the school, but just knew that, you know, I love wrestling,
but it's time for me to startlooking at the next chapter of my life
and I want to be you know, I want to be the number one
guy has done a tremendous, tremendousjob with that and standing the wrestlers,
you know, love this time atCal Baptist. You know, I think
he still even got in the roomevery once in a while to go around,
but just prioritized, you know,had to become a little bit of

(28:45):
an adult at you know, twentyone years old to figure out all right,
I need to figure out where's thebalance in my life and to contribute
as much as I need to withDivision one wrestling in order to to is
confident in my success moving forward withthe Army. So made a tough decision

(29:06):
that made it happen. But I'mwhere I'm meant to be. And if
I have to make this tough decisionabout a decision about the sport of wrestling,
at the end of the day,I still know that I'm in the
world shifting gears. Now. Youtalked about fishing tournaments, and you know,
being in Baltimore, there's there's anaffinity for for the maritime life there.
You know, being out on thewater is something. I grew up

(29:29):
on the Chesapeake Bay on the southernside down there, down in the Hampton
Newport News area, a little fishingvillage called Pekosa, and so I've spent
a lot of time in the watergrowing up. I spent a lot of
time crabbing and fishing and right onthe flats and you know, took the
boat out after school, that typeof thing, you know, following you
on Instagram at Original Craner, yousee you spend a lot of time on
the water and then that's something you'vemade now a career out of with with

(29:52):
your role with mcolsro Towing. Sotalk about how you got out. Actually
we talked about becoming an adult.So what you know, you find this
career that that checks some boxes foryou? What was what was the draw
to the industry you're in now andwhat is the company? What what is
your role there? Yeah? Soyou know my Uh, I'm fortunate enough
to live directly across the street fromone of my best friends, so he

(30:18):
has been with McAllister for nine years. I kind of saw his experience and
always had some interest. But againadulting growing up, I had gotten to
a point in life where, youknow, I've been in sales for a
really long time. I started insales right out of college, selling beer,

(30:41):
wine, alcohol, enjoyed that,but decided that that that industry was
not great for me long term,and uh moved into selling power tools for
a little bit. Then I soldhydrovac excavation services. So it always just
kind of in sales, sales,sales, and was looking for a change,

(31:04):
so I actually ended up taking ajob maritime related with a nonprofit in
Annapolis, and that company was calledthe Oyster Recovery Partnership, and we did
oyster recapilitation in the Chessbeak Bay andit was one of those jobs that was
incredibly, incredibly fulfilling. It wasjust I felt every single day that I

(31:30):
worked, I was having an impacton the Chessbea Bay and the oyster population.
And it really opened my eyes tohow much I loved the water,
but specifically the chest Peak Bay,being a Maryland and Baltimore native and spending
a lot of time on it.So I was there for about a year

(31:51):
and it was not a friendly community, you know, driving Baltimore to Annapolis
every day, and so I justsent to my buddy Ryan, Hey,
you know, I'm thinking about makinga change, and he just expressed that,
you know, two and a halfyears ago that McAllister was kind of
hurting for good employees and if Iwanted to give it a shot, and

(32:12):
that would be the time to doit. So I kind of pulled the
trigger. While I was still workingat ARP, I went through the process
of getting my licensing set up forthe Coast Guard, and as soon as
he came through, you know,interviewed, got the job, and decided
to make the jump. And youknow, even my best friend Ryan will
will tell you that he wasn't evensure how it would work out for me,

(32:35):
because it is not for everyone,especially the schedule that we've run in
the Harbor from here in Baltimore.You know, you work fourteen days on
you're off for fourteen days, whichis great, but you're working a four
months worth of work in those fourteendays. There are days where you're working
around the clock. You know.I mentioned to you, I got home

(32:57):
around two o'clock this morning because weworked until until a little after midnight last
night, and then I had tostick around and get things buttoned up on
the boat and cleaned up for thenext crew coming on. He wasn't sure,
you know, he's seen a lotof people come and go, and
uh, Fortunately for me, youknow, being a wrestler kind of dealing
with adversity, dealing with sleepless nights, dealing with going to bed hungry,

(33:22):
dirty, beat down, sweaty,hot, you know, you name it.
I have come to find comfort indiscomfort and it was a very easy,
natural transition transition for me and Ilove it, you know, I
love working on the boats. SoI started out as a deckhand with McAllister.

(33:44):
So, like I said, wedo harbor assist work. So all
of the ships coming in and outof the Port of Baltimore. If if
McAllister is not doing it, there'sanother another company. So we're we're bringing
in you know, large cargo shipswith cargo containers, roll on roll offs
work as well car containers. Oneof the largest car containers in the entire

(34:08):
country. And then we're you know, sometimes dealing with barges, sugar barge
and fuel barge and scrap barges.A little bit of diversity in the kind
of work that we're doing, butlargely in the realm of ship docking and
to assists. But it's been anincredible experience for me. You know,

(34:31):
I've been here for a little bitover two years now and now to actually
have the ability to get behind thehelm and steer these you know, one
hundred feet hundred feet tugs. Twoyears ago, I would have laughed if
you would have said that I wouldhave felt comfortable even thinking about the idea

(34:55):
of steering and operating a tugboat.So it's been It's been great, a
lot of growth, you know,a lot more to do as I'm going
through the process of of upgrading mylicenses and you know, continuing to work
my way up to becoming a captainon on the tug here in the harbor.

(35:15):
But you know, it's I feellike I've found found my place,
found my niche found that I've reallykind of belonged on the water all along,
you know. I I tell peopleall the time, and I will
continue to probably do this for someof my wrestlers in the future. If
I had known about this industry,if I had known that it's a great

(35:39):
way to make a living, itcan actually actually be rather fruitful as well.
Again, this is the maritime industryas a whole, not just tugboats.
But you know, I probably wouldhave gone to main mayor time or
they wrestling now exactly, and beingable to have a college experience where I

(36:00):
could have wrestled, but also setmyself up to to be a step ahead
in this industry. And that's howcompetent. I feel that it's more more
so than anything you know, Iwe kind of talked about in my el.
I just I think it's the rightindustry for wrestlers because again, most
of us have grown to become comfortablewith being uncomfortable and getting outside of our

(36:24):
comfort zones and being pushed to ourlimits. And this is this is definitely
an industry where it's not always fun. Uh. There are good days and
bad days, and the bad dayscan be really bad where you're you're dogged
out, you're tired, but youknow it's you always find a way for

(36:45):
that one last rep where you knowthat that for one final push that you
really need to get done to.This is the kind of industry that you
know, wrestlers can can really excelit because you know, if you have
a if you're a wrestler and youhave a love for the water, I
think you needy to find a wayto get your foot in the door any

(37:06):
type of a maritime career because we'rewith the right kind of breed for the
job. One thing that kind ofstood out to me is this is not
an industry that's foreign to me becausemy dad was a crane maintenance at the
Newborn News Marine Terminals for almost fortyyears, so being familiar with that.
Now, let's jump forward to Marchtwenty six of twenty twenty four this year,

(37:29):
right around what one in the morningEastern time, MV Dolly decides to
malfunction. I don't think it wasdeciding to malfunk. The ship malfunction you
can see on the video if you'veseen it on social media or news clips.
That from your perspective, take meback to what you guys knew about
this shipping vessel before it collided withthe Keybridge and sent the Keybridge tumbling into

(37:51):
Baltimore Harbor. Yeah, so,you know, we have welcomed the Dolly's
sister ships here to Baltimore in thelast week, so there. Uh it's
you know, through the Mayor shippingline. There's a group of ships built
by Hyundai in Korea, and uhso you know, for us, it's

(38:12):
just another container ship that was goingto come and go and and and leave
the harbor. Just another job forus. And we were on the arrival
for the Dolly. We we broughtit into the port of Baltimore and brought
it into dock there and and thenwe're also on the job while we were
sailing it. So just kind ofa you know, not anything special.

(38:35):
You know, there are some specialships that that come and go here.
Some of the Evergreen ships that comein and out of the harbor, you
know, are are touted as thelargest container vessel to ever enter the port
and things like that. But forthe grand scheme of it, you know,
this was an average size ship andit was just kind of business as
usual. And now it will bea ship that lives in inf me here,

(39:00):
you know, in the industry,but even more so Baltimore natives.
It is the Exxon Valdiez of containerships. Now. Yeah, and you
know, the key Bridge has beenyou know, when when I first heard
about what had happened, you know, I received a call shortly after one
am of someone telling me that thekey Bridge had fallen in And to be

(39:23):
honest, I was in such asuch a deep sleep when I got that
call. I took two seconds toopen Google on my phone Google key Bridge
collapse. Nothing popped up at thatpoint in time, and I said,
this guy's just messing my things.And I hung back up and went to
bed. And then around four am, my dad called me, and that's

(39:45):
when I knew something about My dadcalled and asked me if I was okay,
and I was like, yeah,I'm in bed. Gave what's up
and I was go scheduled to goback on to work in the following day,
and he's like, the key Bridgeis gone. And uh, that's
when I knew it was reality.And you know, it's something that us

(40:07):
here in Baltimore. You know,it was our worst possible dream. I
mean, it was the the worstcase scenario for what could go wrong,
and you know, just a seriesof unbelievable events that kind of brought this

(40:30):
event, you know, to areality. You know, I thought that
bridge would be there my entire life. I have grown up living on the
water down in Sparrow's Point with thatkey Bridge as the backdrop. You know,
you could you could see the bridgefrom my backyard. Your Instagram posts,
I mean we're looking at your video. I mean there you are out

(40:51):
there. I mean going back youknow years, you go through your Instagram
reels and your stories, You've gotone that's for a key Bridge. I
mean, the key Bridge has beena back of your life for for even
before this job. So when whenthis thing, you know, I see
this this unfold. It's an iconicfigure and you know, granted it's not
a skyline thing with you know,like It's not like Inner Harbor, but

(41:12):
it's still you key Bridge is Baltimore, man, This is this is part
of the core of what people fromBaltimore. You know, look, is
the the iconic bridge is what itis. I mean, granted, I'm
terrified of very tall high bridges.I mean it's it's one of those things
with heights and bridges. I don'tdo well. I don't do well in
Tappahannock on that bridge down there acrossthe Rappahannock. But like the Key Bridge

(41:34):
freaks me out every time I driveacross it. But it is, you
know, it's one of those thingsthat it's bal It's like it's it is
to Baltimore as Natty Bow is toBaltimore. It is indeed it is indeed,
you know. And and for asmuch love as I have for the
Key Bridge, you know, II love for Natty Bow as we oh
get the same one really different artists, but uh, you know, for

(42:01):
me, the Key Bridge always symbolizedhome, whether you were vacationing in Ocean
City or whether we were driving outto Ohio tournamented champions to wrestle. When
I was a kid, when youhit the Keybridge, you knew you were
home, and so, you know, for me, when when I got
the call and you know, Iwent back into work the next day to
kind of start helping with the recoveryefforts, there was a lot of emotions

(42:24):
for me. You know, Iwas, I was really I didn't realize
how much thousands of tons of steel, how big of an impact it had
on my life until you're watching thevideos on the news and then holding up
on it for the first time andseeing it in person. I mean it,
Uh, it shook my world.And uh, there are just a

(42:46):
lot of thoughts and a lot ofmemories started to come up, and it
was tough. It was really tough. And you know, I think I
kind of expressed my post on Instagram. You know, there's there's a good
bit of ambivalence for me because Ireally missed the bridge and I know there's
never there's never going to be anotherone. But at the same time being

(43:08):
able to kind of harness that emotioninto let's get to work. You know,
there's work to be done. Whatcan we do to help, what
can we do to contribute and findinga way for McAllister to be able to
help out and for myself to beso fortunate to be employee there and be

(43:29):
able to be a part of thoseefforts. That's that's what I will carry
with me now. You know,I hope to have kids and grand kids
down the road. And you know, the family property I live on been
in my family since the twenties andI'm hoping it will continue to stay until
the twenty five hundred if if wecan make it happen, and I'm hoping

(43:53):
that, you know, a newbridge will come. But the stories of
the former bridge that was there,and and you know grandfather great grandfather's efforts
to UH to help make sure thatthat we could open the port again as
as quickly and safely as possible andUH and and find a way to construct

(44:15):
a new bridge. I hope myefforts are something that you know, my
family will continue to tell stories aboutfor years years to come. You know,
it was a real tragedy losing thebridge, but you know, it
showed how strong the city of Baltimorecan be. And you know, there
was a lot of outsiders that camein. You know, we had UH
tug cruise and divers from you know, I was taken out guys from Louisiana

(44:38):
that came up here in the middleof the night. You know, I
was talking to one guy. Hewas in the middle of mo and his
lawn down south and phone rang andshorn up and as a call saying,
hey, we need you to headnorth and dropped what he was doing,
pack the bag and called Baltimore homefor the next three months just to be

(44:58):
a part of the efforts. So, you know, the city Baltimore just
tremendously grateful to to everyone that cameout to help, you know, everyone
that was not local, everyone thatthat called Baltimore home for you know,
the ninety two or ninety three daysthat the vessel was here in order to

(45:19):
clean up and and open the Portof Baltimore. And then you know the
locals that we're able to contribute rightaway and our local first responders, fire
ems, divers through the state andlocal police. Just an incredible and incredible
moment to be a part of cleaningthis up. What's the most important thing?

(45:44):
First? Is it clearing the channelto get the harbor back open?
Like what's the what was the processof what was the planning process? Like,
okay, the strategy we got toclean this up we got to get
the harbor open. What are thesteps? What's what's the hierarchy of importance
when when opening the harbor backup andthen ultimately starting that that that repper,
that that repair process for the bridge, which is obviously it's gonna be years

(46:06):
away from finishing that. But youknow, what's what what steps are the
most important here? The big prioritywas to kind of open some temporary means
of access through the bridge channels.So they ended up opening three kind of
temporary spans under the bridge, butthose were those are the priority efforts.
And uh, you know, forus, obviously the bridge collapsed, there

(46:28):
was no maritime traffic coming in andout of the Court of Baltimore. But
just outside of the port in myhometown in Spaa Point, Uh, there's
a trade terminal down there called treePoint Atlantic and they accept a lot of
roll on, roll on traffic,roll on roll off traffic, so mostly
cars, so they were continuing tooperate. So for us, it was

(46:53):
we were trapped inside the bridge andhow to weak it out, to to
even do those jobs to keep onesmall fraction of the overall sports productivity going.
And you know, there was anothercompany who they were kind of stuck
in outside the harbor with some oftheir tugs. So they continued to oversee

(47:16):
the work that was going into tradepoint in and out while we were helping
with the salvage efforts. So soafter after a few weeks, they were
able to open three temporary shipping lanesto allow you know, small draft vessels
in and out, so that wouldbe mostly barges, not heavily loaded barges

(47:40):
with coal, sugar, whatever elsethat they're bringing in. So those were
starting to come in first. ThenI'd say priority number two was to was
to start to increase the depth ofsome of the main shipping channels. You
know, two of the temporary shippingchannels. Without there being extensive dredge work,

(48:06):
they weren't going to be able toopen them up to a large draft
vessel or a vessel that runs alittle bit deeper in the water. You
know, how deep do we needthe channel to be, So in order
for the ultra large container vessels tocome into the harbor, that main channel
is now back to fifty feet indepth, so that is where they kind

(48:27):
of like it to be. Youknow, when we have coal ships that
come in and out of the harbor. Sometimes they have a draft greater than
forty feet and that you know,maybe six or eight feet below. It
is a little bit of that.That's your safety debt. You know,
your average ship, if it's comingin unloaded, could be twenty three to
twenty five feet in draft. Andthen taking the load, you're normally up

(48:51):
in the high thirties. And then, like I said, the heavily loaded
coal barges and things like that,they're the ones that are in access and
twenty feet draft. So you know, the bridge span was was laying on
the floor of the of the channeland kind of the roadway was a bit
intact still as well. So thecrews out there, you know, Number

(49:15):
one, they had to get thebridge spans out using very very large cranes.
You know, they had one ofthe largest cranes in the entire world,
the Chesapeak one thousand working here tohelp to help make those heavy lifts.
And then we also had the largestI'm trying to remember exactly the wording

(49:37):
on this, but essentially it's adredge, kind of clam shell dredge,
and from my understanding it's the largestin our hemisphere. Was here to do
the dredge work. So not onlydid they have to lift the bridge out,
but then they actually had to physicallydredge to use this large clam shell

(49:58):
to pull up pieces of roadway anddebris that had kind of settled at the
bottom. And you know, wehad very large cranes there that all they
were doing were dropping uh massive weights, you know, kind of like an
anvil over and over to break upthe roadway that was still intact at the
bottom of the channel in order tosuccessfully use that dredge to to pol it

(50:22):
up. So, you know,we there was a lot of a lot
of relief in seeing some of thelarge spans of the bridge lifted and pulled
out, you know, because youcould not visibly see a bridge there anymore.
But then when you talk to thedivers and you realize what they were

(50:42):
dealing with down below number one,with recovering the bodies of the victims there,
it made their work work near impossible, you know, the limited visibility
here in the harbor, in thein the Tasko River. But then all
so dealing with just you know,the way it was explained to me,

(51:05):
it was just twisted metal and rebarthat you're trying to navigate through and through
in order to help recover these victims. And you know, and then all
of that needed to be broken downinto smaller pieces in order to actually be
lifted out. So it was againa releaf to see the bridge fans lifted
out. But then there was awhole another level of work that needs to

(51:30):
be done in order to clear thoseshipping channels. And you know, the
channel now is now back to fullcapacity, so you know, fifty feet
in depth and a thousand feet wide. So we're back to you know,
pretty much back to normal now.You know, after three months time,
we're able to welcome back pretty muchany ship that would have called it on

(51:53):
Baltimore as a port in the futurefrom it. Is this something they prepare
you for when you when you geton the job. Here is like you're
you're you're pulling in ships. Butthen you know, I don't think this
is in a manual. Is itlike how to how to deal with uh
oh, here's something that crashes intoa bridge. Oh and here's here's some
recovery of people that were killed inthis thing. I mean, this isn't

(52:14):
this isn't in the manual. No, by no means, and you know,
we take training very serious. UHhere at work, you know,
we do monthly modules the UH onthe computer, and then we're also daily
and weekly doing drills you know,fire fire drills on board or loss of

(52:34):
steering drills, and you know whatwe do in this situation. And UH,
this was definitely not something that wewere ever prepared for. Again,
I don't think any of us reallythought that it would ever be a possibility
that something like this would would reallyhappen. You know, we've we've dealt
with it in the past with UH, you know, large vessels losing power.

(52:57):
Typically it's in a situation where weare able to to things are able
to be done, you know,the ship is able to regain power,
or you know, they're able tobe close enough to to a dock or
appear to be able to get backand help. We've never thought, never
thought that it would be a possibilitythat this thing would be underway and it's

(53:20):
such a rate of such a rateof speed that it would be unstoppable and
and it would end up collapsing andtaking the bridge down. So you know,
I I think there'll be more trainingmoving on in other areas of the
country where where there are bridges thatthese large vessels are passing under. I

(53:43):
think I think you'll see the theindustry continue to evolve with the power of
the ships as as the length ofthe ships and and the size of the
ships increases. I think you'll seea correlation with the the power and the
size of tugboats. I also thinkyou're you're going to see some changes made

(54:05):
on you know, uh, requirementsfor for escorts. You know, when
tugs are there. You know,at the end of the day, our
tugboats are only so effective, andwe're trying to move these massive, massive
shifts, and when they're at excessivespeeds, you know, a lot of

(54:27):
them are coming traveling up to Baltimorein the excess of twelve to fourteen knots.
There's not really much a tugboat cando. So I think more than
anything, you're you're going to see, you're going to see more protection made
for for bridge and roadways and thingslike that in order to make sure that
a catastrophe like this can never happenagain. And then secondarily they'll find out

(54:52):
how, you know, can thingschange with tugs or with ships or with
burn and calls in order to tosee what we can do to help keep
the waterways and you know, bridgessafe and from just a personal perspective on
how big these things are, becausea lot of people say, you live

(55:13):
in the Midwest and you might seea cargo container on the back of a
tractor trailer. Okay, those arepretty big, you know, forty some
feet. When you actually see acargo ship up close from a boat,
like you know it, the shadowjust covers you completely. Like how you
know, put in perspective the firsttime you saw one of these big,

(55:34):
behemous ships up close and be likewow, yeah, you know, for
me one of the first times goingout on deck as a deck and to
put a line up on a ship. You know, where we are physically
attaching our tow line to the ship, whether it's to a sunken bollard on
the hull of the ship or we'resending a line up to a bit on

(55:57):
deck. It engulfs you. Imean, there's no other way to explain
it. Where there is nothing outsideof your peripheral vision other than metal and
steel. You know, there thereis nothing that you're seeing. You know,
it's a lot of times we're doingthese jobs blindly in regard of we

(56:22):
don't know what's on the other sideof the ship. And you know,
now that the weather has started tochange here, there's a lot more fishing
boats in the harbor, a lotmore recreational boaters that are out where they
just disappear. You know, youreally don't know what is on the other
side of that ship because it isa wall of steel in front of you.
So it's it's humbly, you know, because you know, like I

(56:47):
stated before, my personal boat,I run a nineteen foot center console that
I run out of my house.I've been on, you know, fifty
and sixty sport fishing boats before.Being on a ninety plus foot tug boat
was wild for me, like,wow, this is a really big boat.
And then you get along a thousandfoot ship and you are now the

(57:08):
little fish in the pond again,and it's it can mess with your mind
a little bit, you know,you just wrapping your head around. I
thought this was big, and uh, this is on a whole other level.
You know. We've we've seen thethe ever Max, which is one
of the largest container vessels to comein the United States, come into Baltimore,

(57:32):
and I was on that and againthat that takes it from I thought
these ships were huge, and nowthis is the biggest, and it really
puts it into perspective and it seemslike they're just going to get larger,
larger and larger, you know whenwhen you think about it. Uh,
there's a great graphic online that showsyou the A lot of people think that

(57:54):
the Titanic is was a very largeship. When you look at it in
the ratio and the perspective of thesize of the Titanic to a modern day
container ship, it is dwarfed byit, dwarfed in size and comparison.
So on screen we've got Titanics likehalf the size, maybe a little bit

(58:17):
more, maybe a little bit longerthan half. Yeah, so that's uh
containership almost twice as long as Titanic. And now granted this article on screen
is ten years old, but yeah, that's big. Despite never actually seeing
it, you know, most peoplethink that that was a huge ship,

(58:40):
and it pales in comparison to thesize of ships that are actually moving about
through the countries and the world sportsnowadays. So yeah, and here's one
thing again, growing up on thein the Chesapeake Bay. You know,
I traversed the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnelalmost every day of my college career,
just because I from one side.I went to college on the other worked

(59:04):
back on the peninsula. As wesay, the Hampton Newport News region separated.
The peninsula is the side Hampton NewportNews. Then you go through either
the Monitor Merrimac or the Hampton RoadsBridge Tunnel you're on the south side.
Then there's that giant bridge, theChesapeak Bay Bridge Tunnel that spans the mouth
of the Chesapeake Bay. So whenwe're looking at this from a shipping industry
type of thing, I mean bridgesand tunnels. We got tunnels there,

(59:30):
so I mean it also makes youunderstand how deep you're going underwater when going
through the HRBT, which is atraffic funnel like no other in Hampton Roads.
It's the bane of our existence whenwe travel. But you know,
you're okay, oh, you've gotto be at least fifty feet underground,
and then you've got to figure outhow much silt and sediments on top of
your tunnel below that fifty feet forthose channels. And then we got aircraft

(59:52):
carriers coming through from Norfolk Naval AirStation there. So the shipping industry,
the ports, i' a lot.I mean it's it's so closing the harbor
is a huge impact. It can'tbe understated on the impact on the economy.
And then for you guys, fora company like Mccauser Towing, I
mean, like you guys are rightthere in the midst of the clean up

(01:00:15):
the set. I mean like thisis this is probably one of the most
important things you guys ever been calledupon. So what was what was the
leadership in the administration, like fromfrom from the top down for you guys.
Yeah, so you know, wehave phenomenal leadership here. You know,
my general manager here in Baltimore,he was willing to get out there
and find out how we can helpas quickly as possible. You know,

(01:00:37):
he was able to set contracts inplace to make sure that our tugs were
available twenty four hours a day,around the clock for the duration of the
of the Dolly being I guess youcould say it was a ground as well.
So you know, it hit apillar up the bridge, but it

(01:00:58):
it also ran a ground slightly sofor the duration of it being there,
kind of encapsulated in the remains ofthe bridge. He made sure that we
were available twenty four hours a day. You know, we had leadership from
the top, you know, ourmain main offices in New York City.
We had leadership that came out andgot on our boats along with us.

(01:01:20):
You know, they they were thereside by side with us, seeing what
we were dealing with on a dailybasis. You know, we're largely hungry
men on board, so the occasionaldelivery of new food rations and just a
little maybe bit of a special treator something like that goes a long way.

(01:01:40):
But really we met more than anythingwas having you know, the people
from the top, people from ourcorporate office, from our national headquarters taking
the time to make the trip downfrom New York get on a smaller vessel
to be kind of brought brought outout and to hang alongside us out on

(01:02:01):
the tugs to see what we weredealing with. I know, it went
a long way for a lot ofus. You know, it's to kind
of have the leadership out there inthe trenches with you, if you will,
it goes a long way. So, you know, tremendous, tremendous
amount of leadership, and there hadto be so much communication that had to

(01:02:23):
be done on their part in orderto make all this happen, and it
kind of went seamlessly for us.You know, things changed day to day.
You know, there were certain dayswhere we started to work a schedule
of hey, you're out here foreight hours and then we're going to rotate
with another boat for eight hours becausewe needed that twenty four hour day coverage

(01:02:45):
with with at least one boat bythe Dolly. But due to the forecast,
you know, winds are supposed topick up, they're supposed to be
heavy rain that would bring out additionaltugs and and kind of set us up.
And then as they continued to makemoves, uh to to coordinate moving
the Dolly in and out. Imean, there's just logistically so much that

(01:03:07):
goes into it, and it seemedlike a seamless effort for for all of
us, and you know, madeit just made it easy, made it
so that we could focus on,you know, our sleep when we needed
to get our sleep and rest andand this was our time to work and
and and our time to be dedicatedto to the efforts out there. You

(01:03:30):
know, I I kind of emailedyou ahead of time that we actually brought
in an additional vote to the area, just so that we could provide a
service of making sure that we hada way to get divers out and on
see while they were dealing with thesalvage and recovery efforts. So, you

(01:03:51):
know, through the coordination of ourof our our main offices in New York
and our port in Philadelphia, wewere able to acquire you know, a
new smaller vessel because of the need. Had the need for a smaller vessel
like that had come in Baltimore,and uh, within a matter of days,

(01:04:13):
we were able to coordinate and say, hey, but uh, let's
go up and get this vessel fromPhiladelphia and bring it back down and get
it to work. And it startedworking the next day and Waltimore and it
worked damn there every day for forthose ninety plus days that we were here.
And I'm actually going to be takingthat vessel back up to Philadelphia this
coming week because they have you know, pretty much finished the work down here.

(01:04:34):
There's no need for it anymore.But you know, getting additional additional
boats, additional help, you know, whatever needed to be done was being
done. And just again, youknow, I used the word pride a
lot, but it brought a lotof pride in our abilities to uh to
adapt over and provide for whatever wecould for the efforts here at the bridge,

(01:05:00):
looking at it from again from aguy who's who's you know that the
bridge is burned into your psyche beinga Baltimore guy and now knowing that,
you know, you had a handin at least the start of the rebuilding
and the cleanup, and you knowwhere where's where's the learning lesson here for
you? As far as wow?Yeah, you know, you know,

(01:05:21):
we we talk about this at work. A lot lessons learned, you know,
when we are doing our drills orare going through things. You know,
what what what knowledge did you gain? And for me, I guess
the biggest thing is to never countout what you deemed the impossible. You
know, whatever you think is theworst possible case scenario, even if there's

(01:05:47):
a one percent chance in your mindof it ever happening, you really need
to respect that that one percent.You know, I never thought that.
I never thought that the bridge wouldcollapse if a vessel hit it. You
know, I guess in my mindif a vessel had struck the bridge or
had an illision with the bridge,that it would be just that it would

(01:06:11):
have been an illision where there wouldhave been some damage done to the ship
or the barge or whatever have you. You know, maybe uh, some
some damage to some of the footersof the pilings or the poles. But
never thought that it would take abridge down. Now I know that that
was probably the the higher probability,you know, looking back at it,

(01:06:34):
with the way that the bridge collapsedand and the amount of force coming at
it. Maybe I was being abit gullible into thinking that, oh,
if a ship were to hit thebridge, it would just bounce off of
it and do a little bit ofdamage and then you know, we would
figure it out from there. Realizingnow that uh, nope, and that
that bridge came toppling down like alike a house of cards. So you

(01:06:58):
know, expect me expect the unpossible, or expect the unexpected at the very
least, and really just prepare yourselffor the worst. You know, you
know, expect the best, butprepare for the worst. Is probably the
mindset that I will be taking forwith me through the rest of my career
here in the Harbor of Baltimore.You know, ships will continue to lose

(01:07:20):
power because that's just the way itis. You know, everyone that has
ever owned a boat knows that somethingwill happen. You know, how big
it is, you're gonna get towedin eventually, exactly. And and I

(01:07:40):
think having that understanding that you know, it's it may not be human error,
it may not be at the faultof the crew. There are just
things that can happen when it comesto boats, and you know, and
and in this regard very large boatsships, you know, there are things
that are going to happen that aregoing to prevent it from steering, that

(01:08:02):
are going to cause loss of power. And it's really just power job to
be trained well enough and really tobe calm in those incident instances where you
know, okay, this is I'mprepared for this, and right now I
just need to focus at the taskat hand, and that is getting a
line up on the ship, orgetting the chip safely back to its port,

(01:08:24):
or maybe you know, pushing thisship back into a channel so that
it can saftly safely navigate and thenuh, you know, run aground on
a on a softer bottom somewhere elsewithout without hitting the structure, or or
running aground in a large in thelargest shipping channel in the area. So
I'd say that's probably the biggest lessonlearned for me is just expect the unexpected

(01:08:45):
and you know, let's be preparedfor the worst case scenario every single day
while we're out here. I know, for me moving forward, I'm going
to want to train my my futuredeck hands and mates to know that,
you know, we're getting through thesedrills and we're preparing, we need to
be prepared for the worst. Youknow, we never thought the bridge would

(01:09:08):
collapse, and it did, soyou may never think that this boat is
going to sing on its own,and there's very well likely a chance that
it could happen. So let's beprepared for the absolute worst case scenario.
And I think that elevates the trainingfor us in our industry, and I

(01:09:29):
think it just makes more prepared marinersto make sure that we can limit the
at least in the number of incidencesand hopefully maritime casualties here in Baltimore in
the future. Graemer White Law.He's with McAlister telling he's also assistant wrestling
coach at Gilman School. Fargow AllAmerican National Prep place winner. Yeah,

(01:09:50):
we got the we got the wrestlingcredentials in here, got the work credentials
in here, and you touched onit briefly in terms of the upcoming trip
for you on the wrestling side.What's next for you in the world of
wrestling. Yeah, I was,you know, blessed to be invited to
be part of the coaching congregation forthe huge twenty pan ams down in Peru.

(01:10:11):
So we're heading out next week anddown to Peru with a phenomenal group.
I think we're going to see aton of success down there when we
bring back a ton of hardware andspecifically gold hardware back to the United States.
But phenomenal opportunity for me. I'mblessed to be able to build some

(01:10:33):
strong relationships out with USA Wrestling inColorado through the process of upgrading to my
Silver coaching certification. So shout outto Mike Clayton with USA Wrestling and USA
Wrestling Development. He's been a tremendousasset and ally for me, so you
know, through through his UH supportand and UH support of me personally,

(01:11:00):
I was given this opportunity. Sowe'll be heading down there to coach you
twenty men's freestyle. A great groupdown there, in Peru and form the
Green Back bring back the Pan AmChampionship title to the US this year,
and after that we'll be you know, preparing for the rest of the rest
of the upcoming high school season.And my hope is to you know,

(01:11:23):
it's more opportunities with US the wrestlingdown the road, so pretty cool opportunity
I get to coach with some veryhigh level guys. I think Kale is
making the trip, Cases making thetrip, which is awesome. Brian Antonelli,
I know, is going to beout there coaching one of his athletes.
Turvel is going to be there.There's some guys that I've become acquainted

(01:11:44):
with over the couple of years.You know, I think they're pretty well
known for being pretty good wrestlers andcoaches. They're going to be out there.
I'm going to have the opportunity tocoach in the corner with them,
So really really excited about that opportunityto learn from the best. You know,
there's no doubt about it. Theyare the best, and UH I'll
have that opportunity to learn more andhave some success with USA Wrestling and hopefully

(01:12:06):
continue to do that down the road. Looking forward to UH, you know,
maybe making my way over to theWorld Championships here in the in the
future and continuing to contribute to buildingstrong men through the sport of wrestling in
USA. So, oh Cramer,it's it's it's been pretty cool to see,

(01:12:26):
uh, see this this journey inpictures and then have the opportunity to
reach out and hear you talk aboutit firsthand about uh, you know,
kind of you know, giving backwhere you're at your job, but it's
also this is where you live,where you're from. This is this is
something that's it's wired into again yourbeing and you know you have the key
bridge for example again all over yourInstagram before you know and now it's it's

(01:12:47):
it's it's burned in your memory forfor what it is and what what you've
had had a role to do for. So the insight in what it's like
to be on a tug and workon this process was very, very engaging
and interesting something and even even beingaround uh shipping contats as as my dad
was for for as long as hewas. It's it's something I learned something
new today and I hope listeners didas well. And I appreciate the time

(01:13:09):
and and rest up, rest up, young man. Enjoy uh, enjoy
the the adulting awesome. Yeah,thank you so much, Jason. It's
a great opportunity. Great to havingwith you. And uh, if I
don't talk to you soon, I'llsee you across the mat. So thank
you everyone. And uh yeah,if you're interested in the maritime industry and
you're in wherever you are, anycity in America, just you know,

(01:13:31):
get to Google, look up themaritime careers, maritime jobs, tug broat
jobs. You can walk into thisindustry with very limited experience, uh,
to companies that are willing to trainyou and and teach you how's how it
works. And you know you can. You can live in the middle of
the Midwest and hop on a planeuh once a once or twice a month

(01:13:53):
to fly out to a major areaand get any industry. So if you
have any interest, I high recommendlooking into its. Wrestlers will only continue
to be successful in this industry andif you have any interest, I definitely
recommend giving it a shot. Sothank you so much for the opportunity,
Jason. The Short Time Wrestling Podcastis proudly outfitted by Compound Sportswear shirts Singlet's

(01:14:25):
custom gear orders. Everything you needcall up Cliffandcrew at cmpteamware dot com
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