A willingness to help in neglected neighborhoods
A pilot boat is a small, fast boat that goes out to sea to pick up ships, to accompany them and help them maneuver when they arrive and leave port. The Pilotine association welcomes, organizes production workshops and helps with professional orientation.
A link between neglected neighborhoods and the sea
In 2013, the co-founders of the association participate in rehabilitation workcamps of wasteland spaces in the northern districts of Marseille.
"In these impoverished neighborhoods, the creation of a skate park brought a breath of fresh air and we were able to create exchanges between residents and local actors. This is how we created Pilotine, whose goal is to highlight the excellence that a young person can show when given the opportunity to work and be put in a caring environment."
The association's objective is to train young people and adults in the shipbuilding industry, while meeting the needs of the local maritime economy. "We try to be the link between local residents and the economic actors of the territory."
The first Pilotine projects were the construction of sand yachts, which were tested on the large beaches of Port Saint Louis du Rhône. Then double canoes and sea kayaks are built, allowing the trainees to make short trips along the nearby blue coast.
A technical approach...
The training provided by the association now covers the various trades that can be found in a shipyard: carpentry, boiler making, welding, mechanics, painting, electricity and sail making.
"We intervene both in the fields of naval maintenance, via our interventions on small projects to be carried out for ships in maintenance in the dry docks (form 8, 9 and 10), as well as in the sector of the pleasure craft, with the restoration of typical boats of the Mediterranean basin" Rémy specifies.
"Form 10 is one of the largest dry docks in Europe. It receives very large ships that come to perform their technical stop. Our presence on site gives us real visibility on such sites, but above all, proximity to the people working in maintenance. Our training courses then take on their full meaning, with a direct and concrete application on a real case, such as interventions on gangways or cuttings to board ships, or the repair of watertight wheelhouse doors, or the manufacture of boxes, sleeves or custom-made pinoches...
We also intervene on the school ships entrusted to the association, often classified as Bateau d'Intérêt Patrimonial (BIP), such as the Marseille fishing boat "André-Jean", 7.7 meters long, the Bantry Yawl "Zoumaï" 12 meters, the classic Bermuda cutter "Margilic" 15 meters.
But also a school of life
Pilotine's guiding principle is to provide an apprenticeship to young people who need it, but also to transmit to them the values of community life or "crew", different from what they may have known.
"We work together, we prepare and share the sea meal together, we are responsible for each other It is common for the members of the association to go out on a few tacks together, in order to value the work done, while developing group cohesion and that crew spirit dear to the association. Pilotine, like the AJD (Father Jaouen's association) is a mix of genres, where profiles from all horizons meet on an equal footing to work on a common project, as on a boat!
A new branch in Port Saint Louis du Rhône
In addition to the development of its Marseilles yard (35 people, including a dozen in the framework of the "sea economy" campus of trades and qualifications), Pilotine is opening a new yard in Port Saint Louis du Rhône at the end of 2021. In order to meet the local needs identified by the town hall and the territory, Pilotine is going to develop a 4,000 m2 site (redevelopment of the quay, paving, installation of workshops with travelling cranes, office area, lifting, storage and sorting spaces) located at the mouth of the Rhone along the Saint Louis canal. On this site, once developed, the association will be able to work for the training in the sea trades, to meet the needs of local economic actors, in particular shipyards, fishermen, shellfish farmers...
In a circular economy approach, Pilotine will set up a classified installation for the protection of the environment and will treat the flow of ships in a dynamic of naval construction/repair or recycling and reuse of equipment and fittings. The site, which will be partially reforested, also plans to treat sea water and to use wind and solar energy.
