Sea Placements

Home Our Cadetships Sea Placements

Benefit from a variety of sea placements.

Chiltern Maritime operate a unique at sea placement program where the Cadets train on various ship types across different marine sectors.

Each year we work incredibly hard to continue to expand our range of vessels and berths as the experience level we can offer cadets in sea phases continues to set us apart.

In a class of our own, the sea time for Deck Officer Cadets over two sea phases is 12 months, and for Marine Engineering and Electro-Technical Officer Cadets it is 8 months.

Despite you being away at sea, our support remains with our mentoring team, on hand to speak with you or help resolve any issues at any time. We plan for this phase of your training to be a rich and rewarding time, and regardless of your course, we aim to support you in gaining as much experience as possible, on a variety of vessels.

We believe it is this experience which allows cadets to make an educated choice as to which sector of the industry they wish to start or pursue their career within when qualified.

Offering a variety of experience to cadets is hugely important to us. Vessels can include:

Tall ships
Super Tankers
Super Yachts
Cruise Ships
Oil/Gas/LNG Tankers
Container
Offshore
Reefer
Bulk Carriers
Research/ Survey Vessels
Car Carriers
Ferries

All sea placements follow the MNTB guidelines for Planned Training at Sea

About Your Sea Placement

Our team will make all reasonable efforts to place you in the sector and type of vessel for which you have identified a preference.

Sea time throughout your programme will be between 8-12 months. Each sea time appointment can last up to 6 months. It is not expected that any cadet trip length will exceed this time span, but there may be occasions when it is necessary, based on the circumstances of the vessel.

It is expected that first trip trainees are placed on-board with at least one other UK cadet.

We ensure you are fully prepared, and prior to joining you will undertake a sea phase briefing, including ship joining information, sea phase expectations and a full TRB briefing will be carried out.

All Cadets are provided in advance with details of the Designated Shipboard Training Officer. This will include the DSTO’s name, rank/job title, and how to keep in regular contact with your coordinator during your sea phases once on-board.

The DSTO will endeavour to provide a suitable on-board mentor for the cadets, who will support, encourage, provide a ‘listening ear’ and appropriate guidance/counsel with regard to issues and problems that may be encountered at any time during the sea phase.

Chiltern Maritime will have regular communications with the DSTO, so any issues that may affect the cadet’s potential completion of the programme can be identified at the earliest opportunity and dealt with quickly and efficiently. Any specific issues or queries that cannot be dealt with on-board can be reported and discussed further with the Operations Director at the earliest opportunity. This can then include possible solutions and options such as an on-board mentor, pairing with another trainee, transferring the trainee to a different vessel, additional sea time etc.

Need Some Help? Read Our Cadetship FAQ’s

Ask A Question

Broadly speaking, what are the typical shift patterns of a maritime Cadet?

Ships operate 24/7, 365 days a year. Usually, when you first join you will be on day work – this is 7.00am – 5 pm (ish) with breaks for lunch. Then as time goes on, you move onto watch keeping, again this is normally split into three shift patterns 8am-12 noon, 12 noon-4pm and 4pm-8pm. This means you will do two – 4-hour shifts a day i.e. 8-12 in the morning and 8-12 in the evening.

During training, Cadets usually get some time off to study and, on occasions, when the ship is in port you may be allowed to go ashore.

If I struggle at college and find a component difficult, is there a chance I can be dropped or pushed back by my cadetship sponsor?

This would be a highly unusual circumstance as full support is given at college to help ensure you pass and keep on track with your studies.

Is my Cadetship contract with the sponsor or with Chiltern Maritime?

Your training agreement is with your sponsor – Chiltern Maritime is the administrator.

Discover the training and life of our cadets, across our varied cadetships...

Deck Officer Cadetship

Marine Engineering Officer Cadetship

Electro-Technical Officer Cadetship

Start Your Journey
Apply Today