The barge

Ok declaration, I am a Portlander , lived on the island or in south Dorset all my life. Am I rasist , probably in a kind of unknowing way , I haved lived in an almost exclusively white British society all my life, know practically nobody from Europe talk about Africa or the middle east, so have little or no sensibility of these other cultures. Do I want to be racist, absolutely not and try to hold myself to better standards than in some dark corners I may actually think. So do I have concerns over the barge , absolutely.
1 Fire on a boat is just about the worst thing ever and the barge even tied to a pier is still a boat. Three sides are unavailable for escàpe , she overhangs the pier so in this case three and a bit. There is only 2 gangplanks off,both on the same deck,so anything that prevents people on the other decks being unable to access that deck and they are toast.Jumping into Portland harbour especially in the winter in the dark well those people who jumped off the top of the World Trade Centre had similar odds.Some of these young men are going to get bad news regarding their residency application and the traditional way of expressing your displeasure is to set fire to your bedding ,at least that's what happens in other establishments on the island.
2 Some years ago we had a jackup oil rig tied up not 200m from there. Locals hearing the forecast told the port to insist the rig jacked down it's legs so it stood on the bottom for the storm. What did they know, so we're ignored, now the wind surface area on that rig was a piss in the wind compared to the barge and it started parting mooring lines until it pulled the mooring bollards the size of small cars clean out of the pier. Luckily having blown across the harbour one leg caught around a small pier next to north ship entrance, 30m either way and it would have torn to bits on the breakwater or somewhere up on the foreshore near the Purbecks.Now the barge will not go that way but if we have a spring tide with rare north east gale watch out. The pier she is tied to was fitted out for fleet tenders and such , 60 to 80 footers not a thing that size and if she comes off there is no room to get a tug in to pull her back they will have to wait for the wind to drop. My brother was a tug skipper and the mooring master in the days of the navy and once spent 30hrs pushing a frigate sideways against the pier against  the wind with two dog class tugs to stop it tearing the pier apart and a frigate is a toy windige wise.
3 These guys are going to want a bit of entertainmentweekends, chase a few girls, such has always been. When we had 2500 jolly jacks in it was no different, however the provist marshal, known as the crushers, kept a close lid on things and all the navy lads knew causing trouble with the locals would result in unpleasant circumstances when back on ship. These immigrants are on just under £10 a week personal money, in larger towns I expect opportunities were available to top that up a little , car washing is popular I understand.I very think it unlikely that will happen here much , work is scarce and the national minimum wage is the wage, they are going to find life poor, tough , boring and isolated.
4. As for our nhs , well it's 4 weeks for a telephone consultation with a nurse practitioner before you might get an appointment for an actual gp and dentist ,well we are private but our dentist does not have a dentist so at present there is no actual service except clean and polish.