Newly promoted bosun Nathan Gallagher and his crew are struggling to keep their heads above water on Below Deck Mediterranean.
The second episode of Season 10 picked up with Nathan reflecting on his own mistakes, including smashing some of Bravado‘s navigation lights while using a crane to load a wave runner back onto the superyacht’s deck. Captain Sandy Yawn cut him some slack, however, pointing out that he’d only been on the boat for 12 hours, after getting a late start due to food poisoning.
As the team leader, Nathan also had to contend with the inexperience of his deckhands, including Tessa Budd, Max Salvador, and Christian Trimino. Before finishing the season’s first charter, the deck crew had already greatly struggled to grasp basic yachting concepts, resulting in slow response times and several major errors.
“I do wanna give Tessa and Christian a chance to prove they’re capable of adjusting, learning, and getting on with the job as fast as possible,” Nathan explained in a confessional. “But I’m not even f–kin’ around anymore. This is actually terrible. This is beyond a joke.”
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While chatting with chief stew Aesha Scott, Nathan said he wished he had Below Deck Med alums Gael Cameron and Joe Bradley on his team this year “’cause they took initiative” and he wouldn’t have to monitor their every move.
Inside Nathan Gallagher’s deck crew’s latest issues on Below Deck Med
As seen on Episode 2, Nathan’s complaints about his deck crew (primarily Christian and Tessa), ran the gamut from their lack of “urgency” with answering radio requests to flat-out not completing assigned tasks. Following a second instance of Christian skirting certain duties during his night shift (in addition to a delay in picking up guests on shore in the tender) in the episode, Nathan had a quick chat with him.
Elsewhere, Christian and Max had been butting heads all episode as well, and Captain Sandy even had to intervene while the two went back and forth during her docking.
“Pay attention to the boat, understood?” she told them. “That’s the last time I’ll say that.”
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Nathan, meanwhile, also gave a less-than-glowing assessment of Tessa’s work performance.
“She’s just like a little judgmental ghost,” he remarked. “She doesn’t speak; she just goes around judging everything, judging you. She doesn’t work. She just stands around. I forget where she is half the time.”
That’s all in addition to their “intense” mistakes earlier in the charter, including an improperly secured wave runner floating away into the Mediterranean.
How Captain Sandy reacted to the Below Deck Med crew’s “complete chaos”
Captain Sandy seemed to largely share Nathan’s views on how the deck crew was handling the first charter.
“Today’s docking was complete chaos,” she stated in a producer interview. “Christian has no idea what he’s doing, while Tessa, I don’t know where she is because she really doesn’t talk. We look like amateurs, ’cause we are.”
It wasn’t lost on her that Nathan was learning the ropes in his new leadership position, though.
“Nathan and Tessa boarded two hours before the charter begins,” she pointed out. “As a new bosun, he doesn’t know that boat. He doesn’t know the crew. And that’s a setback. But I will support Nathan, and he will become excellent at his craft. I have all the faith in him.”
As she told Nathan directly, “This is your first charter. We’re gonna find our way together.”
Later, when he told Sandy that he didn’t “have time to teach” the deckhands, she replied by saying that he didn’t have a choice.
“They need clear directions, even if you write it down,” she advised him during a one-on-one. “This is our first charter. They will get in a routine.”
During the post-charter tip meeting, Captain Sandy maintained her optimism, telling Nathan, “It’s a big job to be handed, but we came off the dock, we didn’t damage the boat…”
Even when he pointed out that he damaged a nav light, she replied, “You learned your lesson. You pay attention. We’ll get through this together.”
In the meantime, find out what Captain Sandy said about her and Nathan’s relationship on and off Bravado in an exclusive interview with The Daily Dish.