MARITIME FAMILY PROFILE
Familiar name runs through 70-plus
years of B.C. maritime history
Photo credit: BC Shipping News
T
Three generations of Burchett: Arthur, Shawn and Ron.
By 1960, while raising a family of
seven (two boys and five girls), Arthur
joined on with Rivtow. He also spent
two years as Manager of Northland
Navigation before starting his own
transportation consulting business.
Through his vast connections along
the coast, and especially within First
Nations communities and the federal
Department of Indian Affairs, Arthur
designed and set up logistic packages
for companyies and towns throughout
the B.C. Coast, including a contract
Photo courtesy of the Burchett Family.
he name Burchett has always
featured prominently in any discussion on B.C.’s shipping community. And with good reason — there
has been at least one Burchett actively
participating within the industry for
well over 70 years. Three generations
of Burchetts — Arthur, Ron and Shawn
— grandfather, father and son respectively — have each contributed to a legacy that demonstrates yet again the
ingenuity, resourcefulness and innovation of local B.C. mariners.
Our story begins with a young Arthur
starting out at Vancouver Tugboat
Company and then Straits Towing &
Salvage before joining up as the Number
One Gunner on corvette vessels during
the Second World War. Following the
war, Arthur settled in Tofino where he
worked for the Canadian Coast Guard
throughout the 1940s. One of the notable achievements in Arthur’s career
was the modernization of transporting
fuel to lighthouses. “We designed a
special barge,” recalls Arthur, “that
was small enough to get into the area
but big enough to carry 5,000 gallons
of fuel. It was a significant challenge
to get the fuel to the lighthouse until
we developed a hose system that eliminated the need to carry the fuel in
barrels.”
Ron (centre) with his two sons, Alan and Shawn.
20 BC Shipping News February 2013
with the Frank family to set up a
freight hauling service from Tofino to
Ahouset. Other significant accomplishments included working closely with
the mining industry and establishing
logistic routes from scratch for newly
opened mines.
It was during the 1950s that the
second reference to the Burchett family
name became known along the waterfront — albeit more as a “pest” for those
early formative years for Ron. “I was
six years old when I started watching
the shipbuilders in Tofino. To get me
out of their hair, they would give me a
box to go and pick up the wooden plugs
to be re-used,” said Ron. “That got me
interested in the whole experience of
designing and building ships — it’s an
affliction that has lasted to this day.”
Ron’s early introduction into the
marine industry was reinforced over
the years so that his resume reads as a
who’s who of companies on the coast:
Texada Towing, Rivtow, Matsumoto
Shipyards, Vancouver Shipyards and
Burrard Yarrows to name just a few.
By the end of the 1970s, he was working with the Central Native Co-op in
Uclulet to build an aluminum fishprocessing system; following this, he
designed a new series of fish boats with
MARITIME FAMILY PROFILE
The Burchett Robert Allan Training Tug (BRAtt) with Shawn
Burchett driving.
the team at Allied Shipyards; and then became best known as
a master of innovation with dynamic working model boats.
In a culmination of experience, starting from the age
of six where he would sit for hours watching and learning
from boat building legend John Hansen, through to building model tugs for Rivtow and then co-ordinating the model
boat show at Expo 86, Ron is only one of two people in the
world who currently builds dynamic working models of vessels including barges, tugs, fish boats and ferries. Working
with Futaba, a Japanese firm known for designing and
manufacturing hobby-grade radio control systems, Ron has
built Voith-Schneider and Z-drives to scale for working models. “No one else was building dynamic working models,” said
Ron. “We saw a need to flesh out the design and the only way
to test is to build an exact model to scale and test.”
Ron currently holds two positions: first as Owner, Burchett
Marine Inc., and also as Commercial Marine Manager
for Corvus Energy Ltd. His introduction to Corvus came
through the need for batteries in one of boats he was testing. From there, to an investors meeting with a core group
of seven people nine years ago, Corvus has gone from a predominantly marine-focused company supplying batteries for
hybrid tugs to one with feasible uses in numerous applications spanning a diverse spectrum of industries.
Referring to his collaboration with Robert Allan Ltd., Ron
noted that “we built a whole new standard of construction
for models including their technical functions”. Ron and Rob
also designed and engineered the BRAtt (Burchett Robert
Allan Training Tug) to address the paradox of Canadian
regulations that require certification for operating a fullsize tug but few opportunities to get the training that would
provide for the certification. “The BRAtt is under tonnage
so you don’t need a certificate to drive it,” said Ron of the
quarter-scale training tug. “The biggest change I’ve seen on
this coast is the inability for someone to do what we did in
the early days — that is, let young people learn by doing.”
Ron points to a bureaucracy and preponderance of regulations in Canada that restricts the next generation and limits
their opportunities to learn. “We need to change the way we
teach — we need more mentoring and we need to encourage
young people to learn by doing.”
Using the younger Burchett, Shawn, as an example, Ron
described how his sons (in addition to Shawn, Ron is the
father to Alan, Scott and Jacqueline) were steering boats at
the age of six. Shawn describes it best as “growing up marine”. “I grew up at Allied Shipyards, watching the ships being
built and driving boats during the summer,” Shawn said
of his entry into the maritime industry. With a deckhand
certificate obtained from the Pacific Marine Campus (now
part of the BCIT Pacific Marine Training Institute), Shawn
worked on charter boats and tugs (including those operated
by Dad Ron) before working for the Canadian Coast Guard
for 10 years. Following his time at CCG, Shawn obtained a
business degree and worked outside of the marine industry
in a high tech firm for a short time. “I missed it too much,”
he said of his absence from the industry. Following positions
with Island Tug & Barge and Seaspan (providing dispatch
and logistics), Shawn has been the Business Manager for
Jastram Technologies since March 2010.
Like father and grandfather before him, Shawn is also leaving a legacy for the B.C. marine community through his work
with the Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue. Since
1991, Shawn has kept up his skills as a mariner by working with
the volunteer organization and was a key figure in the acquisition of two boats — the Craig Rea Spirit, a new 36-foot search
and rescue vessel for the West Vancouver Rescue Station; and
the Deep Cove Lifeboat III, a 33-foot Falkins Class Type II vessel for the North Vancouver Unit. Shawn — a coxswain and
deputy station leader with RCM-SAR — worked tirelessly with
Craig Rea and other volunteers to initially design and fundraise for both boats. Shawn was quick to point out the numerous people and companies that contributed to the project but,
noting his modesty, we see that Jastram, Shawn’s employer,
was also a contributor to the project.
With two children of his own now, Shawn may not be the
last of the Burchetts who make mention in the maritime
history books of B.C. And if truth be told, Arthur was technically not the first sea-going generation of Burchetts. That
honour can be traced as far back as the 1600s when Josiah
Burchett, an Admiral in the British Navy, wrote a book on
naval warfare against France. The next generation have their
work cut out for them. BCSN
February 2013 BC Shipping News 21