Thanks to tugster readers who snap photos and write tugster editorial offices, I sometimes can include dispatches from far-flung places.  Today’s post comes thanks to bowsprite who texted me the other day mentioning a pelican at the North Fork of Long Island.

I had limited wifi at the time, so I expected later to see a photo of a haggard fish-eating semitropical bird blown out of its usual habitat by this summer’s storms.  Later but before I could open the photo file, she asked about VIMS, and I could not imagine why.

But here is is . . . a vessel named Pelican looking faintly military and with ghost letters midships “VIMS.”

Click here for a thorough orientation to the boat since its adoption as VIMS flagship in 2003.  But according to this, a new vessel was ordered, and here it is (as a rendering) . . .

Here’s more about the shipyard in Matane, QC.

Many thanks to bowsprite, who’s especially buoyant these days,  for this photo and news.

Click here for previous posts featuring research vessels.