Random Tugs 300 Extension

I found it hard to move on from the #300 mile marker, so let me offer up another set, with some of your generous contributions.

Thanks to John “Jed” Jedrlinic, two tugboats from Tahiti, Aito Nui and

Aito Nui II.   My machine translator tells me the name means “champions of the universe.” Aito Nui, 98′ x 33′, dates from 2001, built in Concarneau, Brittany. Aito Nui II, 94′ x 34′, is a Damen tug built in 2017. Jed took these photos last October in Tahiti.

From George Schneider, “Here’s one of Curtin Maritime’s remarkable tug rebuilds: Sarah C (501167), 65′ x 24′. She was built in 1965 for Pacific Towboat Co. after they’d been aligned with Foss. She came out as Sea Queen, sister to the Martinolich/Foss M class. In 1974 she was fully fossticized and became Mathilda Foss. She was discarded in the mid 1980’s and was picked up by Mogul Ocean Towing (apparently a corporate name for Campbell Towing) who owned her through 2007. It was then that Curtin Maritime picked her up for reconstruction.”

She’s a beauty. Check out the Curtin webpage here, with its great header photo. George took the photo in February 2020 in San Diego.

Kyle Stubbs:  “I found David has appeared on your blog once before, in Something Different 21.  [Click on that link for an unbelievable transformation.]   At that time, you asked for information about David‘s  continued existence and later names. I’m surprised that it had not come out of the woodwork that she’s still around under her original name, working on Long Island Sound. When I took these photos at New Haven in 2017, she was working for a construction company from Branford, Connecticut called Blakeslee Arpaia Chapman. Given that her Coast Guard documentation still lists her homeport as Branford, I’m assuming that’s still the case.”

Again, it’s hard to believe it’s the same hull given the radical superstructure changes.

TS Poderoso I took in Niteroi Brasil in 2013.  TS Poderoso (name is Portuguese for “powerful”) was built in southern Brasil in 2007 by a company intriguingly named Detroit S. A. Group.

 

On the same trip I took this photo of Cape Cumbria, built Appledore Shipbuilders Ltd. in Bideford (southwestern UK) in 1977.  Technically, it’s not a tugboat, but beside it,

is C Brilhante, a 2008 built tug.

I add this photo because it was taken in Beirut harbor by Godra.  Click on the image for fuller info.  Thank you, Godra.  I’d love to know more about the ports of Lebanon.

Harold Tartell shared this photo years ago, but I never used it until now because I wondered who’d taken it,  when, and what the context was. Maybe Capt. Bill VanVoorhis took it?   Fannie J is currently working in Haiti as Sisters.  She was built in . . . ready for this . . . . 1874!!  1874!!!  Here‘s a photo of her as Sisters.

I took this photo on the Chesapeake in October 2012 . . . Norfolk Rebel in the Great Chesapeake Schooner Race. She’s the world’s only tugantine.

This was the Donjon Shipbuilding yard in Erie PA Febuary 2018.  From left to right, Dorothy Ann (the world’s largest z-drive tug at 124′ x 44′), Joyce L. VanEnkvort (135′ x 50′), and Elizabeth Anna (54′ x 17′).

Salvage Monarch (98′ x 29′) here was crossing Lake St. Clair. Notice the jetski as her workboat.

And I’ll close this post with Mackenzie Rose, the latest iteration of the 2000-built boat from Fall River MA.

Many thanks to Jed, Kyle, George, Godra, Harold and whoever took that photo.  All other photos by WVD.  Thanks for continuing to read the blog.

Time to move on to RT 301 soon.

Thanks to Brian Wroblewski

Last winter I planned a trip along the southern shore of Lake Erie, hoping to catch photos of lakers in ice.  The results were here, a week after ice out, a schedule that depended on someone else’s time off.  It was a fun trip, but the photos I hoped for eluded me.  Well, Brian caught them in the photos below.  GL New York (1913) and Rhode Island (1930) are frozen in, and Oberstar is so deep in hibernation that her shutters are pulled down.

 

Between the stern of Oberstar and the bow of Presque Ile in the distance, that’s Dorothy Ann, half the ATB with . . .

barge Pathfinder, launched in 1953 as the ore boat J. L. Mauthe.  The stern of the newly-renamed barge Maumee clearly shows the deep notch.  Maumee also started life as a 1953-launched ore boat.

er

Tug Victory, which worked in salt water for her first 25 years,  is laid up here between her barge Maumee, until recently called James L. Kuber, and J. S. St John.

Many thanks to Brian for letting me share these photos on tugster.

 

 

Port of Erie PA 3

Maybe you saw this in yesterday’s post and wondered why I hadn’t commented.  Dorothy Ann and Pathfinder have appeared on this blog before.

Soon after I got these photos, they departed to Cleveland to discharge a load–as I understand it– that

had been in the hold since last year.  Ice had moved in so quickly that the unit was prevented from offloading.  I don’t know how much ore (?) was in the barge;  her capacity is 21,260 tons.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Ice 7

Twin Cities tug North Carolina (1952)  breaking ice.  Next two photo thanks to Paul Scinocca on FB.    As I said yesterday, fresh water reacts differenttly than salt water to extreme temperatures.

American Mariner in Twin Cities Ports (Duluth MN and Superior WI)  harbor on what has to be the last run of the season.  Thanks again to Paul.  Here’s more on recent temperatures in the Twin Ports.  Click here for photos I took in Twin Ports a half year ago.

And here, from the FB group Erie Shipping News, a photo (l to r)  of tug New York (and Dorothy Ann and Elizabeth Anna) from December in Erie PA,

and from a few days ago . . .  .  Here’s more on recent weather in Erie. GL tug New York is over 100 years old.

Thanks to the folks at Erie Shipping News and Paul Scinocca in Duluth for this glimpse of early January elsewhere.

GWA7: negotiating the straits of Erie

“Motor city” is another name for Detroit, but “detroit” is only part of the name for the waterway given by the French explorer Cadillac when he led the first Europeans to settle “Fort Pontchartrain du Detroit” on a bank of “le détroit du lac Érié,”  the strait of Lake Erie), linking Lake Huron and Lake Erie; historically,  the strait included the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River.

Some time after departing the Cuyahoga, we pass this mysterious site.  Any ideas?  I’ll identify it at the end of this post.

If you’re not at the helm, straits bring the treat of relatively close passage with other traffic, like Dorothy Ann and Pathfinder here.

Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial is a 352′ monument we can all live with, sans controversy.

As we approach the center of the contemporary city of Detroit, traffic and industry intensify.   I’d never noticed GLW’s glowing slag heaps, like crafted flows of lava.

On the Windsor side, Frontenac transfers payload .  . not sure what.  Salt maybe?

On the American side, 1000′ Edwin H. Gott is likely discharging Superior ore or taconite.

Sturgeon Bay-built Sam Laud watches from the Rouge.  Laud, the namesake, moved from shop painter and riveter to CEO of GATX.

Folks on the bridge of Algoma Olympic, Port Weller-built and down bound here just south of the Ambassador Bridge, must be experiencing the frustration of having to worry about devil-may-care recreational boaters.  Recently, a high profile meeting of stake holders was held at Port Huron to deal with difficult small boat operators, one in particular who decided to play chicken with a freighter .

Last year this China-built tug was called Victorious;  now she’s know as Leo A. McArthur, and as then, she pushes hot asphalt contained in John J. Carrick.

Patricia Hoey (built 1949) is a good example of the extended life experienced by freshwater boats.

A McAsphalt unit like Leo A. McDonald, Everlast, matched as always with Norman McLeod, is Japan-built.

I’d love to learn more about this Windsor home, but the name on the facade is that of the Massachusetts-born founder of Canadian Club whisky.

Just north of Belle Isle, SS Ste. Claire, Boblo ferry sister of SS Columbia,  marks Kean’s Marina.

And with night falling and work for me to do, we’ll leave this post only partway through the strait with Kaye E. Barker, once Benson Ford III.  Notice the GMRenCen in the distance just forward of the front of the self-unloading arm?  GMRenCen was built by Ford.

The return of daylight will find us in Lake Huron.  To see the St. Clair River by daylight, click here.  All photos and sentiments by Will Van Dorp.

The sinuous structures in the top photo depict Cedar Point as seen from a few miles out in the lake.

 

 

 

Meanwhile . . . in the Sixth Boro n Beyond

Many thanks to Paul Strubeck for this foto of a preserved “results report” he has . . .   from a 60-year-old typewriter!  A week from today Working Harbor Committee is sponsoring a great event they call the 20th annual North River Tugboat Race, but clearly there have been more than 19 prior races involving the machinery of the New York City towing industry.  How many races have been held?  Going in “order of completion,” I’ve managed to find fotos of  #2 finisher Barbara Moran and #3  Socony 11 (later Dorothy Elizabeth, shown here racing again in 2007) from Birk and Harold’s site.   Also, here’s a foto of a model of #1 Shamokin.  And a foto from eBay of Wm. J. Tracy.    Finally, here’s a quite forlorn foto of Dalzelleader late in her life.  That leaves me without images of finishers 5, 6, and 7:  Dauntless 14, Russell 17 and Turecamo Girls of that vintage.

Thanks to Charlie Gallo for sending this foto of Mister T (2001) from the east end of the East River, a section of the sixth boro that I’ve inadvertently ignored.    I’ve no idea who the T is Mister T is. Behind the bridge is SUNY Maritime’s Empire State.  Thanks, Charlie.

In fact, I’m always looking for new perspectives, like this one from a week ago over southwest Bayonne, showing McAllister Sisters and Ellen McAllister docking Golden Gate Bridge, with Bebedouro and Islander (I think) in the distance.  Also, in the foreground, it’s drillboat Kraken.

One of the details of ships is their names, like this quite intriguing one.

From a similar aerial perspective, enjoy Turecamo Girls (1965).

How about an unexpected angle on a frequent subject of this blog, Gramma Lee T Moran, running here with an outbound Carnival Glory.

The T in Gramma Lee T is for Tregurtha.   Gramma Lee has this other vessel named for her as well.  She was the wife of Paul Tregurtha, a name that you might know from Ken or Isaac’s blog posts on Interlake Steamship Company vessels.

I spotted one such vessel from Badger earlier this week.  Behold barge Pathfinder and tug Dorothy Ann.

Barge Pathfinder used to be a boat:  J. L. Mauthe. 

Boat-turned-barge Pathfinder now has a detachable engine called Dorothy Ann (1998).

As the person behind this blog, I want to step back a bit and thank you all for reading what I post, looking at the fotos, commenting, and sometimes correcting my errors.  I’ve enjoyed doing the blog for almost six years and will continue.

More SS Badger soon.