Sixth Boro Maintenance

Like a galley or head or deck, the harbor itself needs maintenance of the routine as well as the extraordinary sort.  Given the amount of oil that’s found its way into the sixth boro the past two months, the latter sort is going on.  The bird sanctuary mentioned in the first sentence of this link is Shooters Island .  . whose history I spoke of here about a year ago.

A routine removal of silt from shipping channels is performed by the vessel below–Atchafalaya–as well as Padre Island, which I got closeups of here two and a half years ago.

Here’s shipspotting info on Atchafalaya (1980, Minnesota Twin cities along the river built!!) which I’ve yet to catch close enough for many details.   Here’s still another link on Atchafalaya.

Back to a different set of  post-Sandy extraordinary cleanups involve this vessel, with the appropriate name Driftmaster . . . not that it drifts around the sixth boro.  Rather, it collects and either removes or secures large floating materials drifting in the harbor.

These fotos come compliments of bowsprite.  What I believe is going on here is Driftmaster securing floating docks that in the highest of the surge floated right up off the pilings.  I’m not sure where this Driftmaster was built . . .  It may date from 1947.

Ditto here.  This floating dock needs to be locked back into the pilings.  The crane barge here is moved around by 1965 tug Harry McNeal.  In the bottom foto, notice the square holes through which the cylindrical pilings must fit.

All but the first two fotos (mine) were taken by bowsprite, whom I thank.