Using 65 registered pilots in total, we each year help almost 14,000 ships to smoothly and safely enter and leave the ports of IJmuiden, Beverwijk, Zaandam and Amsterdam. In addition to guiding all sorts of sea-going vessels to the various ports, we also pilot the gigantic cruise ships through the busy shipping traffic on Amsterdam’s IJ river to the Passenger Terminal. We do this in all weathers, 24 hours a day and seven days a week, and have been doing so since the days of the ‘Pilots’ Guild’ from the early seventeenth century.
