On this blog, you’ve seen spinning the king and turning Tabuk, get ready for turning 70, which never looked so good.
That 70 is CVN-70 aka USS Carl Vinson, recently
departing San Diego for points west. These fotos come compliments of Michael Torres, who just a few weeks back sent spectacular fotos of the return to port of Splendor of the Seas.
The orange numbered tugs make up part of the Edison Chouest fleet. I believe these tugs make up a small minority of American tugs with forward-mounted azimuthing drives, or ATDs, in this article by Gregory Walsh in Professional Mariner.
For my mostly east coast eyes, these tugs are a distinctive as Michael’s fotos stunning. I’ve written about them before here.
The names are quite unusual also.
SDMs 7, 8, 10, and 14 turning CVN 70 . . . that’s unfamiliar 
nomenclature for my east coast ears. I’ve got lots to learn about these, but
for now, I really appreciate getting these shots from Michael.
tugster: a waterblog 
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December 2, 2010 at 3:30 pm
Jed
Here in SE Georgia and NE Florida we don’t refer to those as SDMs. At the Navy Bases they are referred to as C-Tractors and in the case of SUBASE Kings Bay: C-Tractors 2, 3 and 4. From the pix it appears that those West Coast boats has C-TRACTOR on their bulwarks as well just like the Best Coast boats
WICKED maneuverable assets equipped with 4000hp and VERY capable masters.