The sixth boro and other harbors have those vessels that seem to hide in plain sight.  Maybe it’s more accurate to say these craft, like the one below,  are visible but their usage might not be so clear.   

Here’s how Annie Moore gets described:  “a utility vessel for the National Park Service designed to transport national and international VIPs to the Statue of Liberty.”   That’s vague and not vague at the same time.  Who are these national and international VIPs, I wonder. 

Here’s more:  “to transport VIPs, official passengers, supplies and equipment to Ellis Island from Battery Park, New York, NY.”    Only Battery Park?  Some contradictions exist in these two pubs.

As many questions as I have with Annie Moore, when HOS Browning came back into port after some days offshore, I have even more.

 I know what the boat does, but I crave specifics.  For HOS Browning, I’d like to know where they went, why that location, what specifically was accomplished with which tools and to what end . . . .

In port, what and who leaves the ship and what and who comes aboard?  Maybe that makes me a landlubber with too much time on my hands . . . .  Who are the crew?

See the name on the bow of the high speed vessel below?  Clearly, it’s not THIS Sea Vixen,  but somewhere in the weapons “kit” carried on Ro8 HMS QE is an enterprise called Project Vixen, involving aerial drones, and named for the de Havilland DH.110 Sea Vixen carrier-based fleet air-defense fighter.  

Technically, the vessel above and below is a 43′ PTB, a personnel transport boat, and  “the HMS Queen Elizabeth class will each carry four PTBs made by Blyth-based company Alnmaritec. Each 13.1 m (43 ft) long PTB carries 36 passengers and two crew to operate the vessel.”  Find more photos here.

The PTB seemed to be flitting all around the boro, checking out the sights.  Who gets to ride the Sea Vixen and who the larger sixth boro-based PTB, whose name I didn’t catch.

Why those sights?  Had HMS Prince of Wales come to town as planned, it would have had evolved PTBs, such as the one here. 

All photos, any errors, WVD, who’s always looking for novelty.