Polling 4 of 4

Thanks so much for voting.  This post will end the “candidates”  soliciting feedback for my 2020 calendar.  The calendar is now a “go,” although voting will stay open until December 21, ie, if you are just hearing about this and have not yet voted–one winner for each month–you can still express your choice, carefully telling me which choice is for which month.

The options for October follow:

A

B

C

D

E

The November possibilities are

A

B

C

D

E

And that’s it.  The December photos have mostly yet to be taken, so the onus for that month is jointly on you all and me.  To repeat, here are the guidelines for a December photo:  a qualified photo for polling must involve a vessel and a non-verbal detail(s) identifying it as having been taken in a December.

Thanks for your help.  I’ll keep you updated on the calendar.

All photos here by Will Van Dorp.

Polling 3 of 4

A big thanks for reading and VOTING.  Once again, see the December 5 post for instructions. Today’s post has only two months, so your vote will be two letters.  Ask your friends to vote.  Voting hasn’t closed for previous installments, and I won’t close the voting until  December 21.

Here are the August choices.

A

B

C

September was a hard month to whittle down to three.  So I offer more choices here than for any other month.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

And that’s it for today’s voting;  remember that today’s vote will be only two letters, one for August and one for September.

To complete the calendar, there’s one more post of options coming tomorrow.  I’ve received proposed photos for the December page, but photos are still solicited.

All photos in this post by Will Van Dorp.

Polling 2 of 4

Thanks for responding to the poll.  Some trends emerge, which made me give the photos a second look.  If you missed the rules from yesterday’s post, click here.

I’m astonished by the top vote getter:  the January photo B, a shot I took on  . . .  and one I almost withdrew from the set at the last minute because I’d taken it outside my usual range.  It might interest you to know it shows the 1949 Wilfred Sykes, named for the president of Inland Steel for most of te 1940s, a few miles below the Soo locks.  Sykes is considered a streamlined [I call it art deco] bulk carrier, the first built after WW2 on the Great Lakes, according to the erudite folks at boatnerd. For more info, click here on the Duluth Shipping News site.

Here’s what I propose for the December calendar photo:  you send a photo to my email.  See left navigation bar for the email address.  Here are guidelines:  a qualified photo for polling must involve a vessel and a non-verbal detail(s) identifying it as having been taken in a December.  I hope that’s ambiguous enough to keep it interesting.  Whoever sends in the chosen photo . . . to be determined no later than December 21, also gets a photo credit and a free calendar.  Another option is for me to choose a December photo from a previous year.  See what I’ve done in the previous 13 Decembers in the archives;  the location near the bottom of the leftside navigation bar allows you to select any month going back to November 2006.

Here are the May choices.

A

B

C

June offers

A

B

C

D

July can be

A

B

C

D

Again . . . see yesterday’s post on the easiest format for feedback . . .

Polling 1 of 4

First, happy sinterklaas day.

Here’s my goal for the next few posts:  since it’s the time of year when some folks think of making 2020 calendars, I’m asking you for feedback on various photos for a possible calendar.  I realize unanimity is impossible.

I’ve quickly gone through my archives month by month and chosen a few “favorites” and as I said . . . gut reaction.  I repeat . . .  no ponderous thinking, just gut reaction.  For some months a “few” means three;  for other months, it comes down to more.   I’ll take your feedback into account qualitatively  . . ie, I’m not just tallying.  So you can help out with a straw vote, a show of clicks .  .  if you will.

Here are the January photos, labeled A through C, that caught my attention using the “gut reaction” test described above.

A

B

C

Here are my February selections A through C.

A

B

C

For March there are three picks, A through C.

A

B

C

And the last one for this post, here are my April nominations, A through D.

A

B

C

D

If you choose to give feedback, it would be sufficient to write simply C, B, C, D . . . for example; meaning the third photo here for January, the second for February, etc.  If you wish to state reasons for your choice, that would be most welcome.

Posts for the next three days will cover the rest of the year.  Thanks for helping out by weighing in.  Bribes are always welcome as well.

All photos and felonious suggestions by Will Van Dorp.

 

 

Thanks to Marc Piché 3

I’ll start with a photo I took in Toronto in September.  I could read that it was called Coastal Titan, but I thought it was a floating dry dock confined to Toronto.  Then in October I saw a photo Marc had taken in July downstream of Montreal, showing

… the same Coastal Titan, pushed by what seemed an intriguingly-named but undersized Salvage Monarch.  And it’s not until today that I search the history of this unusual vessel.  Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine it was once a US-flagged heavy lift vessel named John Henry.   Click here for more of the history of this 1978 heavy lift ship and sister–Paul Bunyan–built by Peterson Builders in Sturgeon Bay WI. Coastal Titan is the survivor story here.

I believe Paul Bunyan, then James McHenry,  was scrapped in 2015; for a photo, see page 8 here.

Marc  also caught Eda (ex-Cedarglen) on her way to be scrapped at Aliaga, with Ocean Echo II on stern and

VB Hispania (2011 and Mangalia, Romania) on the bow.

Click here for previous photos by Marc, to whom I’m grateful for these photos that led me to the intriguing story of Coastal Titan.

 

 

More Dragon

Last week featured a few photos of HMS Dragon over by the Manhattan passenger terminal.  Those photos prompted these from a tug captain on the Clyde, who attended the launch of the vessel back just over 11 years ago.

Click here and, with the magic of YouTube,  you see video of the launch AND the tug, with music.

Here mere seconds before the first splash, the tug has moved away .  .

 

Now the tug moves back in to tether the dragon to grab the bridle and

lead it to a dock.

All photos by Capt. Tommy Bryceland, whose photos have previous appeared here.

 

Big Ones 4

A top hat tip to my eagle eyed collaborators in and around the sixth boro . . .

Here are previous “big one” posts.

See those marking on the base portion of that vertical structure behind the RV?

this is a mighty high-reaching crane base painted like a giraffe’s neck.   It’s actually a perfect paint job for these amazing lifts.

Painters in a second lift are applying the giraffe-camouflage.  I wonder where this large faux giraffe will raise its neck?  Anyone know?

Remember this surprising “cruise ship giraffe”?

And speaking of cruise ships–and more in that photo–behold from the cliffs of NJ . . .   Norwegian Encore, a brand spanking new cruise ship.  Christening will be later this month in Miami.  She has about 6000 beds.

What else I see down there is Chandra B, USCGC Campbell, and a bunker barge accompanied by Fort McHenry.

Many thanks to Tony Acabono and Phil Little for these photos.

Government Boats 52

. .  . starting with Canadian government boats, Coast Guard vessels and CCGS-to-be.  Tor Viking is the Davie Shipyard near Quebec City in Lévis, where she’ll be transformed into CCGS Vincent Massey,  a medium class icebreaker, following the wakes of sister ships into CCGS Molly Kool and CCGS Jean Goodwill.  Another CCGS, Sir Wilfred Grenfell, recently left Labrador for the long trip to British Columbia.

CCGS Sipu Muin has appeared here before with photos from her first pass.  Two days later she flew by even closer, determined to be seen.  That gull off her starboard looks spooked….

 

 

In the distance with the large green dome, that’s Canada’s largest church.

How about a US vessel–USS Indianapolis LCS-17–commissioned in Indiana less than a month ago, here transiting Quebec near the downstream end of the Saint Lawrence Seaway?  Here are my previous photos of LCS models  . . . and others’ photos are here.

And let’s conclude with local sixth boro NYPD marine crew monitoring something

on a red channel marker in the lower portion of the Upper Bay yesterday.

The USS Indianapolis photo comes with permission from Marc Piché, whose photos have appeared here previously.

All other photos by Will Van Dorp, who posted about NYPD boats previously here.

East River Tow

Tech astounds me . . . yesterday morning I got an email from a New Yorker in the UK telling about this event;  tugs are already under way, he said.

I missed the first tug but arrived in time for Liz Vinik, shown here in classic NY context as well as state-of-the-art architecture.

Following Liz was Vinik No. 6., another classic, one I’d not seen in a while.

Both veteran tugs were on the move.

 

Five hours later, and after both my VHF and cell phone had died, leaving me to wait on sheer faith that this was going to happen, the tow appeared into my field of view, westbound at Hell Gate.

TS Empire State IV VI was headed for the yard in dead ship mode.

 

With Liz on the bow and No. 6 alongside, they made their way to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, to GMD, where she would make her way into the graving dock after dark yesterday.

Nicholas tended the stern. Previously she was Maria J. 

 

Had she come around the bend by Hell Gate 15 minutes later, i would have missed this, since I had late afternoon chores waiting.

 

All photos by Will Van Dorp, who is grateful to Steve Munoz for that early morning email from the UK.

 

More Cargoes 21

When Sea Coast towed a barge through the boro the other day, Tony A snapped the next two photos and shared them with me.  And I’m very grateful he did.

You recognize the cargo on this deck barge?  That’s Kings Point in the background.

And from Norman Brouwer, here are some closer up shots he took in New London CT.

The boat dates from 1925, it’s on its way to French & Webb to be restored, and  . . .

 

. . . see the real seal . . . that used to be the presidential yacht.  There’s some interesting info about the boat in the link in the previous sentence.  It was the “floating White House” of a simpler time, and even POTUS 39 regrets having sold it out of the government as an attempt to downsize US executive regality.

Many thanks to Tony and Norman for use of their photos.

For some other Mathis-built boats previously appearing on this blog, click here.