About
Nearly forty years on the water. Most of them in command.
That is the reason to choose us. Knowing which findings matter takes years of being answerable for the boat. TWS Marine Surveying is an independent, NAMS-certified practice in Palm Beach County, Florida, and what nearly forty years buys you is a report that tells you what needs doing now. The things that get missed are rarely the obvious ones. Those are the ones we go looking for.
NAMS-CMSYachts & Small Craft. Verify in the member register ↗
The principal surveyor
Thomas W. Smith
Principal Surveyor · NAMS-CMS
Marine surveying is usually a second career. What matters is the first one, and his was spent running, repairing and answering for the same class of vessel he now inspects.
It started at eighteen on commercial fish-packing vessels out of Vancouver. Cold water, heavy machinery and boats that earn their keep or don't. The kind of start where you learn what failure looks like before it happens, because out there it can't be allowed to.
By twenty-four he was running large commercial tour vessels in Grand Cayman as captain and engineer at once, operating the boat and keeping it running with the same set of hands. That pairing never left him; it's the reason he reads an engine room like an operator rather than a checklist.
From thirty-two, command of private and charter yachts between 80 and 140 feet, the size range most of our clients own today. That included numerous offshore deliveries and multiple passages from Vancouver to West Palm Beach through the Panama Canal. Thousands of miles of listening to hulls, machinery and weather with his own livelihood aboard.
TWS Marine Surveying opened in 2026 on that foundation. The systems on your vessel are ones he has run, maintained offshore and answered for as captain. He knows which faults announce themselves and which ones stay quiet, because he has met both at sea. We overlook nothing. We take the time to make sure nothing is left for you to find out afterwards.
The credentials
Both tickets, and where to check them yourself.
He holds an MCA Master 3000 GT (Yachts), the UK Maritime & Coastguard Agency's command-level Certificate of Competency for yachts of up to 3,000 gross tons, the license the international large-yacht world runs on. Most surveyors have studied the engine room. Ours has stood watch over many at sea.
His NAMS certification is in the Yachts and Small Craft discipline, the senior certification of the National Association of Marine Surveyors, accepted by marine insurers and lenders. It is publicly checkable in the NAMS member register.
How we work
One question, asked properly.
Every survey answers the same question in the end: is this vessel what it appears to be?
Structure, machinery, electrical, plumbing and safety systems are inspected in person, documented with photographs and written up for the people who have to act on the answer: buyers, underwriters, lenders and attorneys.
We cover pre-purchase and insurance surveys, condition and valuation work, damage investigation, corrosion diagnosis and ultrasonic thickness testing. Vessels run from 30 to 180 feet, center consoles and sportfish through sailboats and motor yachts, private and commercial. Most reports land within 48 hours of the inspection, seventy-two at the outside.
We are based in Palm Beach County and at work across South Florida, and we travel nationwide and internationally when the boat is somewhere else. See the six services →
The team
The survey scales with the boat.
A 40-foot sportfish is a day's work for a single surveyor. A 140-foot motor yacht is not.
On larger vessels we work as a team: machinery spaces, tank tops, running gear and topsides covered in parallel rather than in sequence. That means less time hauled or off charter, and it means the parts of a survey that reward a second look actually get one.
Every survey is run under, and signed by, our principal surveyor. The credentials on this site are his, the standard is his and the report carries his name.
The next step
Tell us about the boat.
Which survey, what size vessel, where it lies. Five minutes on the phone settles all three.