Retro Sixth Boro 52

Wow!  August almost passed us by without my doing a glance back to a decade ago.  McCrews is now in Philly I’m told.   Reliance and Justine are still with McAllister.  Lynx was sold foreign  and experienced an incident while being delivered, although I’m not sure how that turned out.  Barents and Yankee both were refurbished by Donjon:  Barents Sea is now Atlantic Enterprise and Yankee is now Signet Atlantic and sans upper wheelhouse.   Mark McAllister was scrapped, and Na-Hoku under the same name works for a company  based in Charleston SC.

 Ellen McAllister here was bringing in the future Alex McAllister, which has gone on to spend a lot of time working in the sixth boro, although I’ve not noticed her recently.

Patrice (had just had a tragic delivery fire in this photo)  and Bruce still work based out of the sixth boro.

 

I never did see Yankee after her upper wheelhouse was removed.  I may have to return to the GOM if I ever want to see her.

Duty is now Nydia P, and I’d have to go to Puerto Rico to see her.

Ireland became Hoppiness, and has been converted to a liveaboard on Lake Ontario but headed the inland waterways of the TVA system.

Labrador Sea is now Vane’s Brooklyn.

And finally, here’s a mixed set:  OSG 350 and OSG Vision still work under those names, Amy Moran became Stasinos John Joseph, and Scotty Sky became a snow bird and sails the Caribbean.

All August 2012, WVD, who after reflecting on all those changes admits to not being the same person as in August 2012 any more either.

 

Retro Sixth Boro 43

I hope you enjoy looking back 10 years as much as I do, although some might say I live in the past a little too much.  Here’s some dense traffic, l to r, Twisted Sisters, Lucinda Smith, Maurania III, and Petrozavosk. 

Up in Lyons NY at the drydock, Governor Roosevelt shows her deep 8′ 6″ belly. Rosie will turn 100 in summer 2027.

Greenland Sea . . . one of my favorites is likely on her terminal lay up.

Does Duty still do duty on the Delaware?

Maria J is now Nicholas Vinik.

Charles D. is still working hard  in the boro, as she was here helping Zim Virginia around Bergen Point.  I do miss the walkway on the WEST side of the Bayonne Bridge.

This Peter is now Long Island . . . or Long Peter if you like.

Resolute assists Maersk Kentucky around that same point.

Amberjack is now Kirby Dann Ocean white and blue, and some of the Bouchard boats are now this Penn Maritime gray. 

Giulio Verne was in town for some submarine cabling, and I’ve heard tell there was a fabulous Italian chef on board.  She’s now docked in Naples IT.

I went to Detroit for Thanksgiving, and made a stop at Mariner’s Church, alluded to in “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” [In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed.  In the maritime sailors’ cathedral.  The church bell chimed ’til it rang twenty-nine time…]  .  I’m told the pastor at the church objected to the word musty and now Lightfoot sings it as “In a rustic old hall in Detroit …”  In fact, you can confirm that here.

And let me throw two more in.  I took this photo seven years ago from Rhinecliff as I headed south the day I completed my season on tugboat Urger.  This was my way of reconnecting with the sixth boro. Maryland is now Liz Vinik.

And finally, a photo from Jason LaDue . . .  it’s Grouper as she looked in 2000.  A week ago her second auction concluded with a winning bid of $4850, but I don’t know who tendered that bid.  According to my source, no movement has happened since the auction concluded. 

Happy November.  All photos except Jason’s by WVD.

 

Retro Sixth Boro 29

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.

 

 

Off Duty

More accurately . . . I could call this “off Duty’s starboard,” as all this traffic passed Duty in a 45-minute period while she was herself “off duty” and on the hook in Gravesend Bay.   Less than 24 hours after I took these fotos, Duty raised the hook and sailed off south.

Two years back I snapped this foto of Duty out of the notch.   Here, if you doubleclick to enlarge the foto below, you can see two smudges on the horizon, one on either side.  Currently off Duty‘s starboard is a dredger . . . probably Padre Island.  Off her port is a Zim container ship.

And something astern of that . . . and

that!

Zim Tarragona is a regular in the sixth boro, although I’ve possibly never posted/identified a foto of her.

Following her is this array, and

outbound, meeting her is MSC Pilar, now Europe-bound.

Together those two vessels carried a lot of containers . . .

Next into the Narrows and meeting MSC Pilar are APL Garnet and a ketch (?) named Bee, about which I know nothing.

Pilar (okay . . . I just like that name) moves under the Bridge at 13 knots . . .

And as they move into the Upper Bay, APL Garnet and Bee meet

Histria Gemma, a sister of whom I included here some six months back.

All this traffic went unnoticed by this fisherman, who . . . by the way . . .  caught nothing from the depths either.

Next vessel in was the speedy Atlantic Compass, itself carrier of some mighty interesting cargoes.

And the final vessel of this 45-minute flurry of traffic . . . . Bow Clipper, previously featured here.  Out beyond Bow Clipper is the slope where the ‘scapegoats do roam.  Click here for a sense of her own roamings.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp, who  . . . during all this traffic, was wondering what was happening on Duty.

What I’ve ben reading lately?  Check out the Arthur Kill deepening project/blasting as negotiated by NYTugmaster here.

Happy 5th anniversary and the demise of Oriental Nicety at Oil-Electric here.

And how does a wind turbine blade arrive in Gloucester?  Check out Joey’s blog here.

Finally . . . from the NYTimes, a new museum in Antwerp looking like shipping containers here.

Names 4

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.” Romeo & Juliet

 

 

This weekend I finally caught the name of this small tug I’d wondered about for two years and it’s a keeper: Iron Mike! How fitting that the tow is scrap metal. Might there also be a Steel Mike, Brass Mike? Gold Mike would need an escort. Oops, that’s a different fleet.

 

 

Duty ties Iron Mike for a no-nonsense name. Duty‘s siblings are Escort and Consort.

 

 

Meet Realist and below, a sibling named

 

 

Specialist! Wonder what future siblings might be called.

Truth be told, I enjoy the variety of fleet naming systems: family trees, seas, social roles, personality types, and … then poetry like Iron Mike… It certainly beats how the bus, train, and aircraft fleets now go . . . all numbers. “The doors in cars 3495 and 7032 will not platform.” EEew! But imagine this . . . Iron Mike and Specialist are bringing Alice in today. Cool!

All photos, Will Van Dorp.