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I’ve re-edited the next two photos I took on May 7, showing RV Substantial as they headed north in the Upper Bay toward Albany.
I initially misrepresented who they were; Substantial is one of the research vessels operated by NV5. THSOA is a not-for-profit, but NV5 is commercial.
I tried unsuccessfully to photograph them west of lock E9 on May 15, but could find no info about their location.
Many thanks to Cori Willson, who caught them at lock E21 yesterday. If you’re on Facebook, check out Cori’s group Historic Erie Canal.
Where have the years gone since I was last on the Erie Canal??!
As of last evening, I learned they were already in the Oswego River. So I contacted a source Jim F. Coop to check if they might be along the wall in Oswego at daybreak today.
Sunnanvik was there discharging cement, but according to a fisherman, Substantial had passed there last night and continued right out into the Lake Ontario, sans an AIS signal, making it a difficult boat to track. If I had to bet, I’d say that by tomorrow morning, she might be in the Welland Canal, although that’s a guess.
Coop also saw Maple Grove (ex-LCM 8168, 1954, Higgins) in Oswego, tied up although she’d been barging around. More on barging around can be found here.
Many thanks to Cori, Coop, and the cigar-smoking fisherman for their assistance.
Substantial is only the latest example of a commercial vessel passing almost unseen through the NYS Canal system, which opened for navigation yesterday. Substantial may have transited the canal last year as well. This blog has featured many dozens of posts showing traffic on the NYS Canals. Ditto . . . lots of posts featuring the US port of Oswego.
It’s not often that a Belgian-flagged work boat comes into the sixth boro, especially one that’s named for an archipelago in the corner of the Indian Ocean over near where it was built and first launched almost 20 years ago. That makes this one really exotic.
Behold Nicobar, one of the Belgian-flagged vessels working on the offshore wind farms over to the east of here.
Here are some specs. As of this morning, she’s still in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, right near the NYC Ferry base there.
As she headed in the other morning, her crew beheld the views of the sixth boro shores,
and some local vessels appeared in some cameo roles, as low clouds obscurer the tops of these cliffs.
Shay Holloway took and shared the photo below. I’m always gratified that others are also noticing unusual visitors.
Welcome, Nicobar. Thanks, Shay. All other photos, any errors, WVD.
Another Keppel SingMarine vessel, Smit Kamara, appeared on this blog 15 years ago.
Little did I know a few days ago that a Details Change 2 would happen, that a follow-up dead ship would be towed in, soon after Cape Kennedy got refueled and her main engines came back to life; in fact, as of posting today, Cape Kennedy is already off South Carolina, moving at 12 to 16 knots. If you’ve not watched it yet, be sure to check out Tugboat Willy’s video of moving Cape Kennedy out of the graving dock in Bayonne.
Meanwhile, this is the latest in a long series of “dead ship” posts. And there’s another to come tomorrow. Find a dead ship definition here.
I had an inkling something interesting was happening when I noticed that Tradewinds Towing’s Isabelle in the offing. This is my first time to see Isabelle, although I have posted other Tradewinds Towing boats here.
I waited for the surprise at the base of the VZ Bridge, Brooklyn side, and this is how the tow looked when they emerged from Seagate, aka Norton’s Point, when they were about 10 nm away.
Hull down is the result of Earth’s curvature.
Keep in mind that Christine M. McAllister is a big tugboat. See the crewman, Bob, beside the bit?
All the photos from the tow perspective in this post come thanks to Bob.
See the VZ bridge tower to the left?
There’s a turn in Ambrose Channel and, from my vantage point, the dead ship didn’t seem inclined to negotiate it.
Christine M. assisted with that. As big as Christine M. is, the ship is 954′ x 106.
At this point, I moved northward to fit the bridge into the shots as the tow came through the goal posts.
Here’s Bob’s perspective, capturing Isabelle
with her exceptionally attractive livery.
Bringing up the stern was Rowan M. McAllister, who was also involved in the dead ship tow-out of Cape Kennedy.
With anchors dropped in Stapleton, Isabelle moved alongside, possibly to retrieve any crew who had been aboard MSC’s Charles L. Gilliland. Cameo appearance . . . Twin Tube!
Many thanks to Bob Dahringer for sharing his photos from the watery side. All others, any errors, WVD.
Names on ships . . . you gotta love some of them. Some of my all time favorites include Platanos, The Patsy Paulie, M.A.R.S. War Machine, Yoga, Herman Hesse, Surfer Rosa, etc . . . .
A few months back I saw a ship with a good one, but didn’t manage to get a photo. It was MV Dali. Hindsight says I’m glad I didn’t get that one because of subsequent notoriety.
Little Tommy Slick is a boom boat, not a bumboat or another kind of boom boat, which are whole other things. Little Tommy transports, deploys, and retracts spill prevention boom during fuel transfers, i.e., preventing any spillage from creating slicks and worse. It’s time Little Tommy gets a sibling named Grace maybe?
Clean Cajun, as it turns out, has siblings with less flamboyant names, like Clean Copano and Clean Destiny, running US LNG around the watery parts of the globe.
This one I’ve posted before. No, not Melissa Lynn but that “bargette” just forward of the push knees . . .
That time it was associating with Louisa Frances. Yes, I’m talking about Chuck Norris . . . he gets around. Sometimes the extra power bow boat looks like this. Fleetmates? I don’t know if there are any but names that could apply include Mike Tyson, Sun Tzu, Rocky 99, etc.
All photos and opinions, any errors, WVD. Ooops . . . all photos except the first one, thanks to eastriver. Opinions and first photo, WVD.
But if you really want weird names, look to the tech industries.
Why am I republishing some photos from a March 2013 post?
Here’s why: the documentary is now on YouTube here. If you’ve never seen the 32-minute documentary, now you can watch it free. If you have seen it, have a second look to see how well it has stood up. If you’ve friends who’ve never seen it, please pass it along to as many of them as you want.
Apologies if you’ve heard me say this before, I’d read about this place years before I actually moved to the NYC area. It gave me great satisfaction to see it, research what was there, and share that.
Producer Gary Kane and I thank you for your interest. We also express thanks to all those who agreed to be interviewed in the documentary and helped in a variety of ways, including the good folks at DonJon Recycling. Special thanks to Bonnie who convinced me to paddle there with her.
All photos above were taken more than 10 years ago by Will Van Dorp, who took the next photo, ILI 105 aka Michigan, just over two years ago. I’d call that photo “nature’s resilience.”
Call this photo of the 1944 Angels Gate aka ST-695 an establishing shot.
More of the boat here.
Admiral, formerly known as Captain, has been around since 1998. That’s a significant promotion.
The 4800 hp tugboat measures 97′ x 36′.
Barbara Jean Mulholland dates from 2013.
She’s 93′ x 40′ and propelled by 6850 hp.
Here she employs indirect towing on an incoming box ship.
More LA/LB, Bay Area, and San Diego to come, as time, personal energy, and wifi allow.
All photos, any errors and omissions of what I once knew, WVD.
Many thanks to George Schneider for assistance.
The jaunt goes on, way inland in the snow for the moment, although I’m coming back to the coast. Snow jaunt photos will catch up, but now I need to go back over a week and start catching up on more tugstesque photos, beginning with a previously sixth boro–and East Coast–boat, Katherine. You remember her, right? Her Pacific Maritime Group (PMG) livery is quite similar to her Weeks colors.
Edison Chouest has what is arguably the most unique livery, as seen from these ECO tugboats.
Taken sightly different angle than the photo above, the photo below shows C-Tractors 9, 7, and 10, with an unidentified ECO tugboat in the rear.
Master dates from 1998, first in the Harbor class.
Here she and Tioga (1994) depart a job just completed.
Scout is the fifth in the Harbor series.
I started with a PMG boat, and I’ll end with another PMG boat with an interesting history, Blarney,
dating from 1945. More PMG in the next post.
All photos, any errors, WVD.
Sticking to the format, days 5 and 6. Enjoy these from Salinas to Sacramento, traveling in the rain at the speed of light. I chose this representative group while drinking morning coffee as well as while sleeping. I’ve tried to arrange in chronological order.
It was too early to try the deep-fried artichokes at the “center of the world.”
Elkhorn Slough, and buildings of what once a dairy farm.
Pescadero Beach looking south and
north
Sausalito
includes a houseboat made of former City of Seattle and
barrage balloon barges.
Beached locals and
and grounded Polaris at Rodeo.
Sandra Hugh assists.
Delaware bunkers.
Cape Fear LASH in Saisun Bay.
Then farther into the Delta [the size and complexity of which I had grossly failed to appreciate] to transit the Sacramento River on The Real McCoy II portion of Route 84 and
then ride the levee looking for
All photos, any errors, WVD, with thanks to George Schneider for local knowledge. Not included here are the other 500+ photos I took.
Days 3 and 4 . . . here are a few, all taken while heading north between Long Beach CA and Salinas.
I could say more and I will, but for now, enjoy these photos.
I’ll have to come back to this in a later post.
This is only several dozen miles from the Pacific.
Photos are not in the order they were taken.
This will be in your supermarket soon.
All photos, WVD.
Unrelated: To understand what likely happened in Baltimore, watch this 6-minute video from Sal, up just a couple hours after the incident: as a friend wrote, Sal is the best.
Today’s post: For the next few weeks, I’ll follow a planned, circuitous route back home to the sixth boro from the Pacific side by car and train. Some posts with photos from the sixth boro are in the hopper controlled by the robots in Tugster tower ready to post if WiFi and time fail me. If you want to follow along, I’m posting mostly photos because–given limited time– the more text, the fewer postings. Thanks for following along if you so choose. You’ll be able to figure out most of the photos, I’ll assume. See the tags for help. I’m starting in San Diego, then planning to zigzag across the country using Amtrak and rental car.
This post has a FEW of the 250+ photos from days 1 and 2.
Remember this Katherine?
All local knowledge and hospitality… thanks to George Schneider. All photos any errors, WVD, who did this last year as traxter.
tugster: a waterblog 
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