Backing Down 2b

(continued from 2a)  … as I was saying, once Margaret senses an opening between Sex and the bulkhead, she nudges the bow over toward New Jersey, causing Laura K to quicken her 5100 horsepower and to send Kills water geysering astern.

Margaret lavishes 3000-hp attention to the bow,

Laura K persists,

Margaret doesn’t relent until Sex‘s

964′ length pivots with the desired angle to slip into the channel toward Newark Bay,

Sex‘s 104′ beam gets squeezed between a total of 8100 hp intensely pushing, while she herself uses nearly 30,000 hp to withdraw

transforming the tugs into flexible thrusters, bow and stern, backing

in the direction of southern Bayonne before

release from the confines of protected waters and a run to sea.  A ship as long as a 64-floor building is tall urged from bonds ashore to energized freedom to rock on whatever seas she encounters . . . all taking less than 15 minutes  . . . tis a thing of beauty.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.