19 | April | 2022 | tugster: a waterblog

I’ve used this title a dozen times before, but never have four relatively recent hulls shared sixth boro waters until now, at least not that I’m aware of.

So let’s start here with an obvious logo and a name I couldn’t quite parse, Viking

Octantis, until I realized it was named for a star visible in the Southern Hemisphere.

From here, they head north and are expected on the Saint Lawrence by the end of April. This is the vessel that is supposed to transform cruising in the Great Lakes, including Lake Superior, using Milwaukee as its hub for the summer months. I can say from experience that Milwaukee could be a great city for this. Here, here and here are more Milwaukee posts previously on tugster.

I understand that Blount tried Lake Superior with their vessels years ago, but Viking will bring in a few hundred guests at a time. Other itineraries explain the name, as they will sail under the southern skies. As of this writing this 2022 vessel is still at the passenger terminal, unfortunately, stern to land, and I wanted to see the bow. She was delivered from the VARD Shipyard in Søvik NO in January 2022.

As of 1130 today, she headed for sea, for Charlottetown PEI, specifically.

Another 2022 vessel arrived in the sixth boro yesterday, USCGC Clarence Sutphin WPC-1147, the 47th Sentinel-class cutter has delivered to the USCG. After christening, WPC-1147 will head off to Bahrain.

Christening is here most likely because the namesake was a Queens native. I thought that learning this would help me understand the origin of this major street near where I live, but it seems both street and hero have names traced back to the old country. The new cutter overtook the container ship under the VZ Bridge.

While we’re looking at hulls delivered in 2022, here’s another, with noticeable style-cousins already working in the boro. I’ll let you look for the similarities in superstructure. James K was recently delivered to Weeks, as reported here.