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Let’s jump back to May 2012. Over along the Manhattan side of the East River then, I caught this scene. Since then, there’s been some movement: Peking to Germany, Marion M to the Chesapeake, Helen McAllister to . . . rebirth as new steel.
Cheyenne has migrated to the Lake Michigan for now.
Twin Tube is still around but sans the boom.
Ellen McAllister is also still hard at work in the sixth boro, but I don’t see her doing much indirect towing as here.
Mark Moran was just passing through from the shipyard to Charleston.
Swan, built in 1981 and showing as her last movement three and a half years ago in China, has likely gone to rebirth as new steel.
But a decade ago in May 2012, she was here to move some used tugboats over to West Africa. Here she’s already down and BFT No. 38 with a crew boat strapped on has already been loaded, while
McAllister Sisters and McAllister Girls wait with three Crowley tugs,
Cavalier, Pioneer, and Mars.
After they are floated aboard, the tide turns the anchored Swan.
Socrates and Heron also float aboard, and
overnight, Swan gets deballasted and raises the hull, so that we can see their five-bladed wheels. More of the story here.
Also in the boro those days was Picton Castle, showing the flag and more, maybe recruiting some hands
before sailing away. Does anyone have news about her? Has she really stayed in Lunenburg since late 2020?
All photos, WVD, exactly 120 months ago.
Unrelated to any of this, read this May 2004 article by the late great Don Sutherland and reflect on how much change has occurred.
How about a quick post today, all three photos taken in a two-minute span on March 25, 2011. The third photo here is set to enlarge when you double click; let’s see if FB allows a preview with that.
Congestion: I don’t know what barge Sea Raven is pushing, but the Allied boat and First Coast are headed for the Gate on the East River. Sea Raven became razor blades in 2018. First Coast began as Morania No. 18.
Into the photo rides Hercules! Hercules was just off the ways at Washburn & Doughty in Maine, and on its delivery trip to Texas, where I believe she works with G and H.
Then into the photo also crowds Penn No. 4. Penn No. 4 ended up with Curtin Maritime in Long Beach CA but is currently out of service.
All photos taken during a busy two minutes, WVD.
It’s March 1, and that invites a look back to March 2011.
Vinalines Queen is where I need to start. Less than two years after I took this photo, the 2005 bulk carrier was lost on a run between Morowali, Indonesia and China with a cargo of nickel ore, with the loss of all hands (22) except one.
Morowali has 19 nickel smelters. Nickel ore is considered the most dangerous bulk commodity. Two other nickel ships were lost in December 2010. Here‘s info about the single survivor of the sinking.
Assist here is provided by Miriam Moran.
Kongo Star was just off the ways when I took this photo; and the small tanker (13011 dwt) is still working and currently near Rotterdam, in fact, in the town where my father was born.
Entering the KVK, it’s Ross Sea and Houma, each with a barge. Houma was scrapped a few years ago already. Ross Sea is currently in Philly.
Heron, here passing CMA CGM Puget, was sold to a Nigerian company in 2012. The 4404 teu ship dates from 2002 and is currently traveling between Korea and Mexico.
Greenland Sea shows her Candies origins. She may currently be laid up. Torm Kristina just passed Cape Town, on a run between Asia and South America. She’s a large handysize crude tanker launched in 1999.
Ron G, now Captain Mark, is docked in Jacksonville.
It was in March 2011 that I first visited Puerto Rico. In Fajardo, I saw Isla Grande and Cayo Norte. Both are Blount boats, launched in 1976 and 1995, respectively. Cayo Norte is still working in Puerto Rico, although I’m not so sure about Isla Grande.
The 1973 Harvey Gamage is currently near Charleston SC. Can you recognize the tall ship off her stern?
Of course, it’s Bounty, launched in 1960 and lost over 100 miles SE of Cape Hatteras during Hurricane Sandy.
March 2011 was a busy month. I’ll post more photos of the month later.
All photos, WVD.
I took this photo in Waterford eastern terminus of the Erie Canal on November 1, 2010, and the canal had not yet closed. I had just returned from part of a transit, and we had met lots of boats. Although we had been bound for the Great Lakes, most, like the intriguing Baidarka, was bound for sea. As of this writing, Baidarka is back on the Canadian Pacific coast.
A week later, in the sixth boro, docked in front of USNS Sisler, it’s the “love it or hate it” Sea Raven, now turned into new steel.
Sea Bear was engaged in the deepening of the sixth boro, and here a crew on the sheerleg was repositioning the anchor.
Lots of dredges including GLDD New York were involved. More later. Captain D, currently in the sixth boro on other duties, was dredge tender.
Then, as now Atlantic Salvor, was active. I particularly like this shot with the 0730 “golden hour” light. A very different set of buildings then largely defined the Manhattan skyline.
Wanderbird swooped through the harbor on their way south.
Padre Island and Terrapin Island were regulars recontouring the sixth boro bed.
Beaufort Sea, 1971, is no more.
The brilliant colored Little Bear, built 1952, became a DonJon vessel, but I’ve not seen her since the Disch auction.
Susan Witte . . . I can’t tell you anything about her either.
Back then I would spend my Thanksgivings in Philly, and the high point of that holiday was not the excellent food and drink and company, but rather seeing the big barge for the first time.
Pilot towed in La Princesa, here assisted up the Delaware by Grace and Valentine Moran. Pilot has been sold Panamanian, and La Princesa–577′ x 105′–I’ve neither seen nor heard from. I believe Valentine is still active, but I don’t know about Grace.
All photos, WVD, who looks at these and wonders how a decade has so quickly passed.
August can be hazy, and it appears that some August days in 2010 were, as below when Colleen McAllister towed dredge spoils scow GL 501 out and Brendan Turecamo (?) moved Bouchard barge B.No. 260 westbound in the Kills. Colleen has now traveled from sun to ice out to the Great Lakes, where the 1967 4300 hp tug is currently laid up. Brendan is alive and well and working in the sixth boro.
Kimberly Poling, then in a slightly different livery than now, pushed Noelle Cutler in the same direction. Both still work the waters in and out of the sixth boro.
These days I just don’t spend much time near the sixth boro at dusk, but here Aegean Sea pushes a barge northbound in the Upper Bay. Aegean now works the Massachusetts coast, and I recall she’s made at least one trip back to the Hudson since 2013.
On a jaunt on the lower Delaware, I caught Madeline easing the bow of Delta Ocean into a dock. The 2008 4200 hp Gladding Hearn tug is still working in the Wilmington DE area. Delta Ocean, a 2010 crude carrier at 157444 dwt, almost qualifies as a VLCC. She’s currently in Singapore.
Madeline is assisted here by Lindsey, the 60′ 1989 Gladding Hearn z-drive boat rated at 2760 hp.
Duty towed a barge downstream near Wilmington.
Recently she has sold to South Puerto Rico Towing and Boat Services, where the 3000 hp tug is now called Nydia P. I’d love to see her in SPRT mustard and red colors.
I traveled from the sixth boro to Philadelphia as crew on 1901 three-masted barkentine Gazela. In upper Delaware Bay, we were overtaken by US EPA Bold and Brandywine pushing barge Double Skin 141. Gazela, like other mostly volunteer-maintained vessels, is quiet now due to covid, but check out their FB page at Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild. US EPA Bold, now flying the flag of Vanuatu and called Bold Explorer, is southwest of Victoria BC on the Salish Sea. She was built in 1989 as USNS Bold. Brandywine, a 2006 6000 hp product of Marinette WI, has today just departed Savanna GA.
Getting this photo of the barkentine, and myself if you enlarge it, was a feat of coincidence and almost-instant networking, the story I’ll not tell here.
On a trip inland, I caught Tender #1 pushing an ancient barge through lock E-28B. I believe Tender #1 is still in service.
From a beach in Coney Island one morning, I caught Edith Thornton towing a barge into Jamaica Bay on very short gatelines. Edith is a 104′ x 26 1951-built Reading RR tug that passed through many hands. currently it’s Chassidy, working out of Trinidad and Tobago.
Here’s another version I shot that morning. For even more, click here.
The mighty Brangus assisted dredge Florida. Back in those days, the channels of the sixth boro were being deepened to allow today’s ULCVs–like CMA CGM T.Jefferson— to serve the sixth boro. If I’m not mistaken, Brangus has been a GLDD tug since it was built in 1965. Currently she’s in the Elizabeth River in VA.
Here she tends the shear leg portion of a GLDD dredging job. See the cutterhead to the left of the helmeted crew?
On another hazy day, a light Heron heads for the Kills. The 1968-built 106′ x 30′ tug rated at 3200 hp was sold to Nigerian interests in 2012. I’d love to see her in her current livery and context.
Java Sea resurfaced in Seattle as part of the Boyer fleet and now called Kinani H, seen here on tugster just a month ago. The 110′ x 32′ tug was launched in 1981 as Patriot.
And finally . . . probably the only time I saw her, crewboat Alert. She appears to be a Reinauer vessel.
All photos, WVD, from August 2010. If you want to see an unusual tugster post from that month, click here.
For some unusual August 2010 posts, click here.
If you’re new on this blog, for the past 27 months I’ve been posting photos from exactly 10 years before. These then are photos I took in June 2010. What’s been interesting about this for me is that this shows how much harbor activities have changed in 10 years.
Tarpon, the 1974 tug that once worked for Morania and below carries the Penn Maritime livery, is now a Kirby boat. Tarpon, which may be “laid up” or inactive, pushes Potomac toward the Gate.
North River waits over by GMD shipyard with Sea Hawk, and now also a Kirby vessel. Sea Hawk is a slightly younger twin, at least in externals and some internals, of Lincoln Sea.
Irish Sea, third in a row, was K-Sea but now is also a Kirby boat.
Huron Service went from Candies to Hornbeck to now Genesis Energy, and works as Genesis Victory.
Ocean King is the oldest in this post . . . built in 1950. She’s in Boston, but I don’t know how active she is.
Petersburg dates from 1954, and currently serves as a live aboard. Here’s she’s Block Island bound, passing what is now Brooklyn Bridge Park.
Kristin Poling was built in 1934 and worked the Great Lakes and the Eastern Seaboard via the Erie Canal.
To digress, William Lafferty took this photo on 15 May 1966 at Thorold, Ontario, in the Welland Canal, same boat 44 years later.
And finally, she who travels jobs up and down the East Coast, the 1970 Miss Gill. She’s currently working in the Charleston area.
All photos, WVD, who never thought a decade ago while taking these photos that I’d revisit them while in the midst of a pandemic. June 2010 was a great month for photos, so I’ll do a retro a and b.
May 2010 . . . I took my first trip to see the thrills of the southern Arthur Kill, thanks to Bonnie. Back then the hull of Astoria (1925-1967 on the East River Line) was still there. Since then, I believe it’s been removed . . . said to be an eyesore. !@#$?!! Here’s more from that paddling trip. Keansburg Steamboat Company operated it until it ended up here. If I read The Boats We Rode, Roberts & Gillespie, p.13) right, I’m wondering why it spent so many years before being broken up. And why isn’t it listed here?
ABC-1 was hauled out back that month. I know some of you are happy to see what she looks like below the waterline.
OSG Vision was new, and spent some time at the Bayonne shipyard. Here she’s nose-to-nose with Horizon Discovery.
I recall vividly this spectacular spring morning before work . . . Irish Sea went by pushing DBL 103, passing NYK Rigel at Howland Hook. Mornings like that tempted me to skip work.
I’m not sure where this boat is today, but I did manage to get close-ups out of the water here, three and a half years later.
Heather M II here passed NYK Rigel. I’ve never seen Heather M since, I believe, but she has classy lines and a great bow pudding.
Colleen was still in salt water back then. I’m not sure she ever thawed out after a late December transit to Lake Michigan six years later.
Janice Ann, here pushing RTC 28, was still around here. If you want to read about life aboard Janice Ann, I did a review of a book written by one of her captains here.
Niz C. Gisclair was an exotic in town, likely here working on a dredging job. She has a Marquette logo on her stack.
Sorry about the backlighting here, but it’s Allied’s Falcon in the Kills. She has since appeared on this blog as Carolina Coast.
And finally . . . a sad shot of sister ship of Day-Peckinpaugh, launched as Interwaterways 101. The vessel below was launched two months later as Interwaterways 105, and from 1936 until 1976 operated as Michigan. She’s languished in the AK for decades, possibly since 1976. She’s an Eriemax, tailored to the dimensions of the Barge Canal locks, built in Duluth 99 years ago!
Here’s the same vessel on the Erie Canal, date and photographer unknown.
Yup . . . after 18 days of virtual Erie Canal touring, I needed to sneak another Erie Canal pic in here.
All photos except the last one by WVD.
On this glum April 1 and the 25th month in a row, the blog looks back 10 years on day 1 of a new month . . . and sometimes day 2 as well, with a selection of photos from exactly a decade back, 120 months ago. What’s particularly interesting for me about this look back is the degree of change in the boro, replacement and realignment otherwise going almost unnoted, like movement only visible in slow motion.
Allied Transportation and their tug Socrates were still around; the company got absorbed into Kirby, and the tug was sold and transported to Nigeria almost eight years ago already. Here she passed the statue on her way to Florida with the barge Sugar Express.
On this Easter morning, Patapsco hurried eastbound in the KVK. Patapsco has been sold out of Vane and now carries Steven Wayne nameboards.
I recall that same Easter morning; Ivory Coast appeared to float in the air as she headed into the Kills. She still carries the same name and livery.
A bit later that morning, the 3800-teu Al-Mutanabbi, launched 1998, headed out with her containers; since then, the ship has been broken up on the south bank of the Yangtze in Jiangyin, upstream from Shanghai. Since then, UASC has merged with Hapag-Lloyd. And Al-Mutannabi, he was a poet who lived well but died young because of the power of his poetry.
Al-Sabahia was the same class/size container ship; she too has been broken up in Jiangyin, just two years ago. Count the number of containers across to understand the dramatic difference in size of some container ships; also, note the top of the wheelhouse is nearly at the deck level of the ship, compared with here or here. If you count carefully, that’s 20 across, rather than 13. Laura K Moran, escorting her in, has been reassigned to another port.
A unique flat-fronted tug, locally-built tug called Houma, 1970, was still around. She’s been scrapped. Beyond her is an interesting and eclectic cluster of lower Manhattan architecture, with one of my favorites, the former Standard Oil Building, just to the right of the black pyramid.
We’ll pick up on more April 2010 photos tomorrow. With increasing restrictions on movement around the boro, I might be digging into my archives a lot for a while. If you want to help by dipping into your own archives for photos and stories, I would greatly appreciate that. Maybe it’s time for new permutations of truckster, teamster, bikester, autoster, planester, hutster, hikester, storyster, . . . let’s help each other out.
All photos taken by and stories researched by . . . WVD, who wishes you all health. Hat tip to you performing essential services out there.
Coastline Girls and many other names including Gage Paul Thornton and ST-497, the 1944-build now sleeps deep in Davy Jones locker, and was not an intentional reefing.
It’s been a while since I last saw Mcallister Sisters, shown here passing the Esopus Meadows light. If I’m not mistaken, she’s currently based in Baltimore.
Ten years ago, this boat had already been painted blue over orange, but she still carried the June K name board.
Socrates, classic lines and a classic name, has since gone off to Nigeria, riding over in mid-2012 on a heavy lift ship called Swan.
Urger on blocks in Lyons . . . one would have thought then that she’d run forever. These days she’s back on blocks at the eastern end of the Canal.
And February 2010 was the time of prime iceboating, and that’s Bonnie of frogma.
James Turecamo, with its wheelhouse down as I rarely saw it, works these days upriver as far north as Albany. Photo by Allen Baker.
Brandywine and Odin these days spend most of their time on Gulf of Mexico waters.
Gramma Lee T Moran straining here as she pulled the tanker off the dock. She now works in Baltimore.
In the foreground, East Coast departs the Kills; I can’t say I recall seeing her recently,but AIS says she’s currently northbound north of the GW. In the distance and approaching, June K, now Sarah Ann, and she regularly works in the sixth boro.
All photos, except Allen’s, WVD, from February 2010.
I have to share back story about getting that top photo. I was on foot on Richmond Terrace walking east toward Jersey Street when I saw the Coastline tug and Hughes barge. I didn’t recognize the profile and realized I could get the photo ONLY if I ran. At the same time, I noticed an NYPD car had pulled over another car, and you know, it’s never a good idea to run for no apparent reason when the police are nearby. But . . . you understand my dilemma: walk and miss the shot, or run and maybe attract the curiosity of the police officer. I ran, got the shot, and sure enough, the police called me over and wanted to know what I was doing. Since I knew I’d done nothing wrong except appear suspicious, I gave him my business card and launched full tilt into my “new yorkers are so lucky because they are witness to so much marine business traffic, and why didn’t he too have a camera and join me watching and taking photos of the variety of vessels . . . .” You can imagine the stare I got. My enthusiasm failed to move him. No handcuffs, no taser, not even a ticket, but an impassive gaze from a weary officer of the law possibly wondering if I’d escaped from an institution or a time warp. He wrote up a report and left me with this advice: don’t run when you see a police officer nearby. “Yessir,” I said, thinking . . . well sure, but I’d likely do it again if I again noticed something unusual transiting the waterway. Since then, though, I’ve not had any further encounters with the LEOs, at least not on the banks of the sixth boro.
I have represented these “retro” posts as a slice of the sixth boro exactly a decade ago, but it more like . . . what in the boro caught my attention. So welcome back to December 2009, as seen from today, December 2019, taking advantage of 20/20 hindsight. And, to digress, I’ll bet the term 20/20 [2020?] hindsight will seen a bit strange in the next thirteen months.
Over at South Street Seaport, a group of vessels then is no longer there: Marion M, Peking, and Helen McAllister. Of those, Peking, though not the oldest, has the longest and most convoluted saga.
Sea Raven is no more, but with those high pipes, she always caught my attention.
Cable Queen seemed to have a future back a decade ago, but naught seems to have come of it, since last time I looked, she was still docked in Port Richmond. For context to this photo of the 1952 vessel, click here.
NY Central No. 13, scrapped in 2017 . . . also seemed to have a future back in 2009, although the owner was not in a rush to complete the job.
In 2009, the sixth boro was in the midst of a several-billion-dollar dredge project, as folks were talking about these ULCVs that would be arriving after the opening of the new Panama Canal locks. GLDD’s dredge New York was part of that effort.
I don’t know if Volunteer is still intact, but I’ve not seen her in years. Here she lighters Prisco Ekatarina while Mark Miller stands by. As of this writing, Prisco Ekatarina is in the Gulf of Finland.
Does anyone know if Horizon Challenger, built 1968 in Chester PA, still floats?
Patriot Service currently works as Genesis Patriot.
I believe Escort is laid up.
And let’s close with these two. Below it’s the now modest looking Ever Divine and Tasman Sea, and assembling photos for this post, for the first time I see the Taz’ devil sign on the stern of Tasman Sea . . . Maybe I’d seen it before and just forgotten. Ever Divine is currently crossing the Indian Ocean.
There it is . . .
All photos taken in December 2009 by Will Van Dorp.
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