Government Boats 25

The last post in this series–24–was quite obscure.    And this one . . . could be called ex-government boats.

The foto below comes thanks to Scott Craven, who caught the vessel upbound on the Hudson near the Bear Mountain Bridge.  At first I thought it was a re-purposed 65′ WYTL.  With a bit of research, however, I learned it’s the retired Massport Marine 1, Howard W. Fitzpatrick (scroll through to the 8th foto).  Note the traces of removed signage along her port side.  She’s now replaced by American United.   Again, scroll though, and you’ll see the folks on Windermere posted a foto of American United high and dry at the Canadian shipyard here.  Click here for more info on Massport.   Fitzpatrick launched in 1971 from a now inactive shipyard in southern Illinois, just north of St. Louis.   So does anyone know where Fitzpatrick is headed?  Great Lakes?  the Mississippi system?  Maybe a reader upriver can report?

On a rainy day back in mid-April, Gary Kane caught this display on the East River, just south of Roosevelt Island.

It was the John D. McKean, a retired FDNY fireboat.  McKean was Camden, NJ built about 60 years ago.  Anyone know what her future may be?

All this talk of retired fireboats and mention of Gary Kane give me an opportunity to suggest you buy the documentary produced by Gary Kane and myself called Graves of Arthur Kill.  One of the major voices/story tellers in that documentary is a retired FDNY engineer.

Thanks to Scott Craven and Gary Kane for use of these fotos.

Taurus Heads Upriver

I had no idea why Fred Johannsen (47′ loa x 18′ and launched 1971) showed up at the east end of the KVK, westbound.

But a few hours later, she reappeared  . . . with a dead ship.

Taurus, identified on the VHF as a dead ship?!  !@#@!!

Up to Kingston she goes, and at 3 kts fighting the flood, it’s

going to be a long ride.

Click here for a post of almost five years ago when Taurus herself moved another dead ship.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Oooops! 3

Although Magdalen Island was asked nicely, it

would not move.  It would NOT divert its course 15 degrees north.

Thanks to Dock and Kate Shuter for sending along these fotos.

Stuff

sometimes

happens. . .

and we feel major headaches.

 

Sailing Cargo

Is it a vestige of a past whose

artifacts are mostly

disappearing?  Or

is it an enterprise of

what is

to come?

Read how the Danes and Dutch already do it.  These Dutch from Tres Hombres wanted to sail into the sixth boro last year but were stymied by red tape.   Then there’s the Vermont working sailcraft project discussed here.  Andrew Wilner has more examples in his blog here.   Here’s a veritable bibliography of hybrid sail ideas.

Working Harbor Committee presents a panel discussion of this topic tonight from 6 pm — 9 pm in Manhattan.    Click here for details.

All fotos here by Will Van Dorp.  The disintegrating sailboat fotos were taken near Bear Mountain last weekend, and the Black Seal three-masted schooner fotos date from when it delivered 20 tons of cocoa beans to Red Hook in June 2011.   Here and here are related blog posts I did back then.

 

Meanwhile Upriver April 2013

Click here for an ice post from two years and two months ago, featuring the very same tug–Kimberly Poling–with a slightly different paint job.  Know this bridge?

Here’s a closer up shot of the tug/barge.   Our destination is the top of the cliff on the far side.  Know the name?

Here’s looking north from below the bridge.  Freight travels on the west side of the Hudson, although this particular CSX train

happened to be pulling this unit . . . CSX SWAT.  Click on the blue info link at the lower left of that link . . . it is what it sounds like.

The east side of the river has AmTrak and commuter passenger lines and

here a New York Naval Militia vessel.

By the time we’re ready to start the serious climb, Kimberly is about ready to make the right turn around the base of Dunderberg Mountain.

Here’s our destination, Anthony’s Nose, as seen with a long lens.

And as seen from the top looking west and

looking south.  By the time, we got up there, Kimberly was already beyond Croton Point.   Here’s a previous tugster post from Croton Point.  The land directly across the river from the base of the flagpole is Iona Island.

and approaching Tappan Zee Bridge, not visible.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Here’s a tugster post from 2.5 years ago showing the Bear Mountain Bridge–the bridge featured here and located about 40 miles north of the Battery– from underneath. . .  scroll through.  Climb Anthony’s Nose soon . . . before the leaves happen.

Clearwater Maintenance 2013

If anyone out there needs to be convinced of the beauty of the Hudson Valley less than 100 miles north of the big city, take a glance at this foto by Tim Hetrick showing tanker Icdas 11 escorted by a paparazzi savvy eagle.

The foto below shows sloop Clearwater in mid-June arriving at the music festival that shares the same name.

A minute or so earlier . . . Clearwater rounded the bend following Woody Guthrie toward the shallows.

But if anyone has notions of operating a wooden vessel, it’s important to consider the regular maintenance.  Here was a post from about three years ago about work on Clearwater.  Currently way upriver this

is happening again.  All the following fotos now come thanks to Paul Strubeck.  In mid-December, Clearwater was downrigged and hauled out near Albany at Scarano Boat Building and

gently placed onto Black Diamond, with tug Cornell nearby.

Securing the big sloop for travel takes care and time, more time than there is light at the winter solstice end of the year.

But when all’s fast, the trip to where the winter maintenance crew can begin.

Click here for an article about Clearwater‘s winter home in the shadow of the Hudson River Maritime Museum.

Many thanks to Paul for sending these along.  It looks like I need to find time to get up to the Rondout.  The first two fotos in the post are mine.

Diamond Marine Day Last Summer

For reasons you’ll find at the end of this post, I’ve held these fotos in reserve since last June.   Any ideas what’s going on with   . . .  an apparently empty 70-year-old covered barge floating in the river with a bridge in the distance and some fibers in lower left corner.

Well, some crew are aboard, Joe and Paul on radio, as the transition to alongside towing is initiated.  That’s Rhinecliff, NY in the background here.

It’s a demonstration of skills day for certification purposes.   That’s my friend Brian taking fotos, and Matt Perricone, owner of tugboat Cornell making up the tow once that free-floating barge is alongside.  Here’s the official Cornell site.

To document the day, we shoot from a variety of locations and

angles.  This angle I call “elbows in water.”

And this is how to “make up on the nose.”

Designted examiner Sam Zapadinsky of Diamond Marine Services looks on as light boat is maneuvered to a dock in confined river space.

With the barge on the nose of Cornell, it’s time to head back inot the Creek.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp last June.  Here’s the rest of the story . . . and note the byline.

Unrelated:  Here’s a foto of a scene I missed:  Allie B towing dredge Columbia southbound on the Hudson recently.  The link tells some interesting previous lives of the dredger.

Scale 5

As I write this post, Lincoln Sea is southbound on the Hudson, just south of where Stena Primorsk ran out of the channel a month or so ago.  Weddell Sea/Lincoln Sea foto was taken back in earlier September 2012.

This closeup of the Lincoln Sea-DBL 140 embrace seems small and intimate until you read the gradations on the the barge .  . . those numbers mark feet.

Length and breath of the tug-barge unit

is 597′ x 79.’

Ocean Leader, here coming into the Narrows four days ago and currently in Port of Albany,  is also 597′ loa but a little beamier:  105′ . . .  panamax wide.

I don’t have the tug/barge dimensions of B. Franklin Reinauer/RTC 82, here paralleling Ocean Leader.

Behind tugboat John P. Brown (75′ x 26′) lies Stena Primorsk, in the “hole” undergoing repairs at Bayonne Dry Dock & Repair, and shown

here about a week pre-accident.  Dimensions of Stena Primorsk:  597′ x 131′ . . . . 280,000 barrel capacity.  Lincoln Sea‘s DBL 140 capacity is 140,000 barrels.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Post-Apocalyptic Solstice

All hype . . . like Camping and others . . . just to mention recent hoaxes.

Nevertheless, I made my rounds.  High winds chill to the bone but no doomsday out here . . . Brian Nicholas pushed recycling into the Kills,

Catherine Miller moved semis beyond the end of the bridge,

Nomad and Alpine Alaska waited inside the Narrows,

as did Mount Karava, which first appeared here almost brand-new over five years ago.

Padre Island anchored off the BAT, taking time off from vacuuming the channels south of the Narrows.

Michigan Service headed for the Kills.

OOCL Kuala Lumpur shifted  containers.

Given the hype about the apocalypse, I kept eyes wide open for debris and found some, although this is long-planned and controlled demolition.

USCG made their own rounds.

Six years ago, I put up this winter solstice post, led off by this fine foto  . . . compliments of Richard Wonder . . .  of an elegant John B. Caddell, recently lifted off a place where floating things should never go.  And speaking of vessels finding themselves in places that should remain off limits, check out this and this article about a tanker bottomed out on the upper Hudson.   “Bakken crude”    . . . that’s a term I’ve not heard before.    If anyone upriver has fotos to share, please get in touch.

Stormy 2 Afternoon

Fotos from Barbara at Rockaway Beach around 100th Street here.  Emergency message to folks on the boardwalk:  ”Go inside, and no surfing.”

From Gary, East River looking toward the mouth of Newtown Creek and

toward the 59th Street Bridge.    No movement.

And finally, from L’amica dalla torre di orologio . . .  Hudson River . . . looking toward  the Statue of Liberty, who probably wishes she could hunker down behind her pedestal.   Geometrical structure to the left is the floating Battery Park City Ferry Terminal.   I’m not sure what contingencies exist for it during a surge, since it’s basically a hull.

Currently Captain of the Port has order vessels of a certain tonnage to leave the docks, as it’s safer for them to hang in the stream than stay affixed to a rigid structure.   So cruising in the North river now as sightseeing vessels,

Meagan Ann,

and the Sandy Hook pilot boats!

That’s the Erie Lackawanna Terminal Tower/Hoboken Terminal in the background.

USCG . . . off to respond to a recreational vessel that’s dragged its mooring?

And finally, back to Rockaway . .  as nightfalls.

Many thanks to Barbara, Gary, and L’amica for these fotos.  The worst is yet to come, I fear.  Stay inside and away from the tongues and talons of water that surge in.

And this just in . . . video from helicopter of USCG rescue of folks from HMS Bounty.