Random Tugs 392

With greater focus today, let’s start where we left off yesterday . . . here, with that large red mooring ball behind tugboat Maverick.

The mooring was attached to a section of flexible dredge hose that 

was getting towed.  Any guesses on Maverick’s date launched?  Decide that for each of these and arrange them by age, before checking the answers at the end?

Carolina Coast came in light the other day, possibly just off a sugar barge. 

Meagan Ann was eastbound, maybe heading north for scrap.

Michael Miller was moving who knows what.   As a reminder, have you decided the launch date on each of these as you’re going through?  Answers are posted at the end here.

Miss Madeline a bit earlier was working on a dredge project.

Charles A was in from another dredge project.

Susan Rose was pushing oil.

Stephen Dann has since gone to Bridgeport.  

Charles James is still the the boro as of this writing.

And that’s where we leave it today.

All photos and any errors, WVD.

Maverick 1967

Carolina Coast  1970

Meagan Ann 1975

Miss Madeline  1976

Charles A. 1979

Charles James 1985

Stephen Dann  1999

Susan Rose  2019

 

Random Nola Tugs 7

“What do you like about New Orleans?”  A friend asked me that recently.  Different answers exist: ubiquitous and diverse music, unique architecture, history and present through all the senses, spicy and delicious food, free spirits, bons temps roulants…  this list can be even longer.  But for me, the traffic on the river is without rival .  . . that I know of.  That’s what calls me back.  I can even skip the music, merriment, and tastes, but the river always attracts and satisfies.  From my recent stay, here are some photos.

I’m thinking this may be a formerly Bouchard boat, but I really don’t know who this is getting spa treatment.

Any help?

Mary Moran was there too.  She’s of the same general class as Miriam and Margaret.

A. Thomas Higgins is not as new as I thought, but still, she’s not yet at the 5-year mark.  

Here’s a recent article on her from ProfessionalMariner, which among many other things mentions her namesake.  It makes me wonder if this Mr. Higgins is related to Andrew J. Higgins, the “new Noah”

Turquoise Coast, formerly Barbara E Bouchard, was in.

Rodney, the former Sheila Moran, came through with a barge, heading upstream.

Michael S I thought was newer, but she’s from 2009. 

More info can be found here. 

Know this unit?

A clue is the name . . . well, number . .  of the barge, 1964.

It’s Millville, the WaWa . . . THAT WaWa, tug, which I saw under construction in Sturgeon Bay in 2017, which seems like a lifetime ago.  My friend Jack caught the unit in Nova Scotia here,  as she was first headed into salt water.  Take a close look at the last photo in this post from 2017 . . . yup that was what would become 1964. 

All photos, WVD, who wonders if you’ve noticed what type of tugboat I’ve omitted here.  This is not-so-random a selection, as you’ll see in an upcoming post. 

 

KVK Traffic Flow 3

That stretch of waterway can be pretty busy, though not nearly as busy as the automotive traffic arteries of the five boros.  Count them below . . . seven tugboats contained in a single photo frame!!   You can try to name them.  Let me know if you need help. 

One by one, though, they are more interesting to look at.  Can you arrange these by size, power, and age? 

Barney Turecamo.

Allie B.

 

Mount St Elias.

 

Discovery Coast. 

 

Mary Emma. 

 

All photos, WVD.

Largest is Barney Turecamo at 116′ x 36′.  Shortest by a foot Mount St Elias at 95′ x 34′, and Discovery Coast is 96′; least beamy is Mary Emma at 31′. 

Most horsepower is Barney Turecamo at 5100.  Least is a tie between Discovery Coast and Allie B. at 3000 each.

Newest launch is Discovery Coast at 2012.  Oldest by two years is Mary Emma at 1975, and Allie B. at 1977 1976.  I only recently learned Allie B used to do the sugar run into Dominos on the East River. 

Whatzit 50

What made this stand out was the mostly horizontal member quite high off the water.  So I started snapping.

I’d noticed a few days back that Pelham had headed unusually far east in the Sound, and had run

sometimes tandem with Captain Willie Landers.  So this must be the tow.  

Any guesses?  

Names are always a clue. 

McInnis is a name that has appeared on this blog previously.  Here’s their network;  in that link, click on the map enlarger.  Below that, Van Aalst is another clue, given what they do.  So if you looked up both links in this paragraph, you can identify what this is. 

Put them altogether, and you’ve solved this whatzit puzzle:  it’s a dry bulk ship unloader built for McInnis.

Where it is headed and why . . .  

now I’ve no clue. A decade ago, I saw an antique specialized barge like this on the Maas (or Meuse) River;  the barge was named “graanzuiger no. 19,” which is pretty explicit Dutch for what it was designed to do:  graanzuiger translates literally as “grain sucker.”  This barge Resolute might be called a cementzuiger. A similar vessel called a floating grain elevator incorporating some of the same principles used to be quite common in the sixth boro, back when our watery boro was a major grain transshipment point. 

All photos, WVD.

 

Allie B’s Tow at Sea

The sun was setting when we met Allie B

and her tow:  Weeks 533 with Robert as tail boat.  I’d seen the big crane only a week or so earlier doing some lifts in the sixth boro.  This blog has featured this crane in a number of sixth boro jobs and moves going all the way back to hoisting US Airways 1549 out of the icy Hudson 14 years ago. 

At this point, Allie B and tow were westbound at the west end of Buzzards Bay

on their way to the Cape, or so it appeared later.  And yes, as contradictory as that previous sentence sounds, I meant it that way.

Had our meeting been a half hour later, I’d not have these photos. 

 

Allie B has fascinated me since her epic 2009 voyage, when she took barge Brooklyn Bridge to the Black Sea. 

 

Like I said, it was a fortunate meeting as we all sailed in the last minutes of brilliant light before the long winter’s night.

 

 

Enjoy the light show. 

 

All photos, WVD. 

B, D, and 533

From right to left then, that would be Allie B, Sarah D, and Weeks 533.  

The two tugs assisted the crane barge that lifted a large electrical component onto a many-wheeled trailer inside the Red Hook container port.  I’ll post my photos of the truck on my next truckster! post. 

Well over a decade ago, I traveled up to Quincy MA to see Allie B move a long time piece of the landscape out of Quincy and over to the Black Sea port of Mangalia, Romania.  What piece of landscape, you ask?  It was the Fore River Goliath Crane, now painted yellow and set in a yard operated by Damen, although it seems it may now be inactive again. 

Landing the crane at Red Hook yesterday, lifting the cargo, and departing all happened quite fast, less than 90 minutes from arrival to departure. 

 

 

 

 

Happy solstice. Next stop summer.

All photos, WVD.   Hat tip Cyclone Shark.

 

East River Traffic 5

If you’re unfamiliar with NYC, most of the photos in this series are from Roosevelt Island, likely off most visitors’ list of places to see.  That’s too bad, since it offers a lot, including great views of Manhattan and the strait (East “river”) in between.  If you’ve not seen the Nelly Bly memorial at the north end, you’re in for a treat.

 Here are previous posts in this series. Let’s start with the NYS-built Ava Jude, a 600 hp boat not seen on this blog in a while. 

It’s also been a while since Shannon Dann was last on the blog, but that’s because she has had her 2400 hp engines working elsewhere.

Ava Jude‘s 1200 hp fleet mate, William Brewster, has been working on the bulkhead project under the 79th Street bridge for some time. 

This Brooklyn, a Vane boat now but formerly Labrador Sea , also brings 2400 hp to the task, and like Brewster, is Blount built. 

I notice King’s Point‘s training vessel too late to get a side profile shot, but her “name” 142, is a number of great significance at the USMMA.  If you click on no other link in this post, do click on that one. 

Coastline’s Kodi is another New England (Gladding Hearn) built small tugboat, the perfect boat for certain jobs. 

See more Gladding Hearn boats here, although that’s not a complete list, since I notice that Benjamin Elliot and others are missing in that link. 

Michael L. Daigle has appeared on this blog only about once before.  She’s a 4200 hp boat that once wore Kirby colors on the west coast as Mount Bona, named for a major North American peak in Alaska. 

 

All photos and any errors, WVD. 

Random Tugs 384

Happy please-go-vote day.  If you know anyone at all who is eligible to vote but won’t, have a chat with that person.  As a New Yorker, I voted over a week ago . . . early voting on a Saturday afternoon.

Some photos . . .  and your part is to 1) rank these boats by highest to lowest horsepower, and 2) identify which if any were built north of central sixth boro.  I’ve provided dates of initial construction, but tugboats are required to be well-maintained, sometimes repowered and extensively rebuilt.

The 1979 Miriam Moran looked this way in her October markings.  Cancer is a scourge, and I know this remembrance each October means a lot to folks who’ve seen the disease from nearby.

HMS Liberty has worked in the boro for over a decade now.

Laura K. Moran came off the ways in 2008, spent some years here, some away, but now she’s back in the boro.

Mister T, 2001, has carried that moniker ever since. 

Andrea, 1999, has been in the boro a half dozen years.  Here‘s how she looked back in 2016. 

Shannon Dann was built in 1971.

Dace Reinauer dates from 1968 but has been considerably rebuilt from the first time she appeared on this blog here.  See pre-2010 photos of her here and here.

Brian Nicholas, 1966, has been in the boro about as long as I’ve been doing this blog.  I did post a photo of her with Banda Sea name clearly on her bow here 12 years ago.

Foxy 3 was built in 1974 and first appeared on this blog as Barker Boys, a name she carried until 2009, when she was renamed Buchanan 16.  I don’t believe I ever saw her in the Balico livery as BF Jersey although I did see her with BF Jersey nameboards here. Note the folded back upper wheelhouse.

All photos, WVD.

Answers? 

Laura K 5100 horsepower, Dace 3400, Andrea and Miriam at 3000, HMS Liberty and Mister T and Shannon D all at 2400, Brian Nicholas 1700, Foxy 3  1600.

Built north of the sixth boro:  Laura K in Maine and Mister T in Rhode Island;  all others were built in Louisiana.

 

Thomas Dann and Somerset

So I’ve seen Thomas Dann before, although not this one.  I’ve seen this tugboat before but not as Thomas Dann, and I’ve seen this barge Somerset before but not pushed by Thomas Dann or any other Dann Ocean boat.

The most prominent feature of the covered dry cargo barge is the hatch cover crane.

Somerset measures 418′ x 75′ and was built in 1990. Any guesses on deep draft?  You’ll see your answer soon.

 

As you can see in the links in the first paragraph, this Thomas Dann appeared here previously as Amberjack, 1981, 106′ x 32′ and 3900 hp.

Here’s today’s deep draft information.

Since Yonkers is her destination, it’s safe to assume the cargo is sweet.

To digress, I’m starting to find Jaume Plensa’s sculpture annoying, bossy, no matter what the intention. For more of his work, click here.

All photos, WVD.

Sailing Cargo 2

This title goes back almost a decade, and this schooner has been doing cargo runs on the Hudson for a while now, but I’d not seen it yet. 

Fortunate for me, I finally spotted the boat this past weekend, running

from Brooklyn side Upper Bay to Raritan Bay and the Arthur Kill.

I’ve posted photos of autumn sail here and here and in other posts like here, but this one is moving cargo.

As of this posting, she’s in the Hudson Highlands section of the river.

 

 

Cargo or not, sailing vessels have an elegance, a je ne sais quoi . . . .

Wind is the other alternative fuel.

All photos, any errors, WVD.

Apollonia has caught the attention of the NYTimes here about a year ago, and here recently in a Kingston NY paper.  Here’s a joint venture with a microbrewery up the river in Beacon.