Seagull Maritime has become the first overseas company to secure training centre approval from the Panama Maritime Authority following the PMA’s 2014 change of leadership. The approval process included a two-day inspection of Seagull Maritime’s Horten, Norway facilities by three PMA staff.

“We are the first training centre in the world to be audited and approved by the new administration of PMA outside of Panama, as part of an exhaustive review by the Flag State demanding the attention of six Seagull Maritime staff,” said Torger Tau, Manager – Training Courses, Seagull Maritime AS.

The audit confirms the alignment of Seagull Maritime’s entire onboard training programme with IMO Model Courses, and authorizes Seagull Maritime to conduct training courses on PMA’s behalf in line with the lnternational Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping.

“In most cases Flag States review individual courses, while their approval of the training centre itself is based on approvals we hold from the Norwegian Maritime Authority,” said Mr Tau. “Separate approval from Panama – the largest ship registry in the world, with about 8,600 ships carrying its flag – included a request to verify our own record-keeping on seafarer data. Our archive was interrogated at random down to the level of single seafarer records, while PMA required a briefing on our training methods.

“PMA showed particular interest in our updated Ship Security computer-based training modules and the suite of products we have refined to reflect the demands of STCW. However, with more than 9,000 ships using the Seagull training solution onboard, this approval is of great significance for us and our customer base.”

During 2014 Seagull Maritime broke a previous company record, by issuing over 14,000 certificates and course diplomas to seafarers to acknowledge the completion of the training specialist’s on-board courses.