Even though she glowers at me whenever I say it, the six-eyed bowsprite IS perspicacious. As she hops from cliff to cliff and down along the ledges near water level, she misses no detail. She sent me these fotos to share. What is the orange sheet dangling from the yellow frame suspended from the 532 crane?
A nutrient-rich bedding for oysters?
Part of a future underwater moving sidewalk?
A riverbed loom for a seaweed weaving project?
An attempt to soak up sugarmud drifted down from Yonkers?
Habitat for sturgeon and plesiosaurs?
A diversion intended to lure bowsprite down from her cliffs?
Preparations for next year’s Red Bull Air Races?
An attempt to recover aliens and their secrets from the wreck site of an OVNI?
Ichthyosaur survival training drill?
All fotos blamed on credited to bowsprite, whose narative goes like this:
“09h20 Virginia and Elizabeth go upriver to bring mats and crew to the crane Weeks 532. The engines roar, smoke comes out, the spuds are dropped, the crane lifts the yellow loom-thing and splashes it into the drink. A lunchtime crowd gathers, asking each other what’s going on. They say ‘I think they’re dredging.’ Or ‘I don’t know. Been here a few days.’ Or ‘What’s your guess? They talk, they speculate.
Back on the barge, The loom comes up sans the orange mat. Men with stepladders go around and weave on the next mat. Spuds go up, engines roar, smoke again, winches drag in the white buoy, and the whole barge setup moves farther into the middle of the river. Later another mat is laid down just a bit east of the last one.”
And the answer to Whatzit: the truth is out there, or in here.
9 comments
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December 22, 2010 at 2:08 pm
Buck
I’d never have guessed. I thought it was a whale rescue in progress!
December 22, 2010 at 5:52 pm
bowsprite
let’s hope it is only me who glares at you! I don’t have laser vision like our buddies at DHS.
December 22, 2010 at 7:24 pm
tugster
DHS . . . would that be division of harbor shipping? den of hilarious sprites? dreams of Hawaiian surfers? diving into heavenly spuma? you KNOW acronyms confuse me . . . .
December 22, 2010 at 6:55 pm
eastriver
Nice. Erosion control mats; thanks, Tugster, for the LNM. So what is suddenly eroding the tunnel areas/shorelines? Could it be a few years of those miserable gnat/ferries throwing absurdly large, energy-inefficient wakes? Perhaps Michael Fortenbaugh’s J-24s are sailing too fast through the area, and tearing the benthic environment up.
You vote, folks.
December 22, 2010 at 6:59 pm
eastriver
Ooops — did I just make a prejudicial remark? Oh, my…
December 27, 2010 at 11:56 am
Dan B
One man’s erosion mats are another person’s security blanket
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/security_blankets_51luOuX7OZISJOmEzhXThO
December 27, 2010 at 12:22 pm
tugster
Well spoke!
January 13, 2011 at 12:41 pm
Jgg
Explosion mats… Underwater terrorism there was a threat put out about a month or two ago about Al queada and training underwater divers…. very interesting *cough* *cough* Erosion mats *cough* *cough*
January 13, 2011 at 12:45 pm
tugster
although i recognize euphemism as quickly as the next person, the Coast Guard Local Notice to Mariner (no longer available) listed the operation as installation of “erosion control mats.” the December LNM is no longer available, but check this, which calls it ” PATH Tunnels Erosion Protection ” : http://homeport.uscg.mil/mycg/portal/ep/contentView.do?contentTypeId=2&channelId=-17383&contentId=17612&programId=12590&pageTypeId=16440&BV_SessionID=@@@@0849377582.1294946286@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccfademhfjiiflcfjgcfgfdffhdghk.0