The Flushing Pilot or Dutch pilot is a broad, blue-clothed, red-faced man who has hairy hands with mottlings of blue (WD20). The (never-named) pilot takes Goblin into Flushing in We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea and befriends her crew after initially being considered by them as an unfriendly native.
John is at first nervous about asking for help, due to Jim Brading's warnings about being seized for salvage (WD5). He knows he can ask for a pilot when he sees the pilot vessel: We can take a pilot to wherever we want to go. It isn't like asking for help. Jim said so himself. It's quite alright to signal for a pilot. Even liners do it, but tells the others to go below as Anyone (even a pilot, could grab us for salvage with) all of us being so beastly young (WD19). The problem of not knowing the name of the port they are approaching is solved when the pilot asks if John wants to go into Flushing, in English, as he has seen the ensign on the yacht (WD20).
The pilot has been a ship’s boy in a sailing ship, and he refuses to take a fee for piloting them in when he finds that there are only four children (and a cat) on board (WD21).
Earlier, Titty looks at the flag for a pilot, the S flag which is a dark blue square with a wide white border. A note explains that: in the new code the signal for a pilot is G, with upright stripes of blue and yellow (WD6).