Random Tugs 204

I’m guessing Eric R Thornton is off in search of some scrap waiting in

the Bronx maybe?

It’s been a long while since I’ve seen Penn No. 6, and here she and Normandy are made up to Penn No. 121.  See those four shore cranes against the sky?  Here’s a post I did on them almost a decade ago.

 

Here’s B. No. 250 eastbound for the Sound, with

Evening Star in the notch.

Some people would be pleased with this juxtaposition: MTA’s Highbridge Yard, with Harbor II, MetroNorth, and the 44th Precinct Police Station!

Barbara Ann holds station at the University Heights Bridge, with the unmistakeable Hall of Fame for Great Americans dome over the treeline.  That’s a place I’ve yet to visit, one of many places in the five boros.

Ditto . . . Ireland on the north side of that bridge.

 

And to conclude for another day . . . it’s Penn No. 91 with

Skipjack in the notch.

Oops!  All photos by Will Van Dorp . . . from aboard Manhattan II.

Spring Giddiness 2

I think today is a holiday.  Somewhere.  If it weren’t, it just should be.

Actually it’s Children’s Day in Turkey.  And the Feast of St George at the Vatican and in England.  Slay-a-Dragon Day somewhere.  International Talk like Shakespeare Day . . . I could go on.  Feadship’s Casual Water is headed upriver, if not uptown.

Others are going in all directions . . .

mostly southbound.

Grande Mariner was westbound on the East River to get southbound to the River City. Know that place?

Some are Sound bound, and

others like Ma Belle are headed La Belle Province.

I can’t keep track of Elizabeth.

Flowers are blooming and

it’s great out.  Make time to enjoy the holiday.  Oh . . . River City starts here.

All photos in the past few days by Will Van Dorp, who did the first “spring giddiness” here.

East River Traffic

I’ve done other East River series, but it’s time to start a new one.  The next 12 photos were taken yesterday over a total elapsed 11 minutes!  I happened to be near South Street Seaport in hopes of catching santacon craziness there, as I did many years ago here.

Let’s start with Alice discharging aggregates, and barely recognizable, that’s Matilde the cement making vessel.

A longer shot reveals a clutch of kayakers, which I hadn’t seen while shooting.

Down by Red Hook, I see Frances approach with two barges of aggregate.

Dean Reinauer passes, pushing a deeply laden

RTC 106.

 

Those are the stacked lanes of the BQE with the Brooklyn Heights esplanade atop.

Buchanan 1 heads in the same direction as the other two units, but at a slightly greater speed than

 

Frances.

 

 

Again . . . all in 11 minutes.

 

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Chrononauts 1

I have more Saint Lawrence posts, but with a chrononautical weekend behind us, let me digress and report.  The mood for the first ship was set by the weather;  see what the mist did to my favorite downtown building–70 Pine.  Click here and be treated to a slideshow of views through time of boro Manhattan’s  tall observation cliffs, past present and future.

Looking eastbound up the East River, I saw her waiting, as

first one of her entourage arrived and

and then another.

The term “haze gray” was certainly demonstrated yesterday,

as was the vintage of this Liberty ship headed to sea, for a cruise.

 

Even the Higgins T-boat in the distance is a whole decade closer to the present–in inception– than Brown, although  yesterday all crowded into 2016.

 

It was a moving sight,

which I beheld,

only slightly regretting I was not aboard.

 

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Summer Training 3

Here are the previous posts in this series.  This is the SUNY training ship’s return this past week from a “sea term” that began this way on May 10. This first set of photos comes from Roger Munoz, who took them from high above 74th Street.

 

That’s Roosevelt Island just to her far side, and the Queens and the Bronx farther beyond.

Later that morning, Thomas Steinruck took these during the assist back into the dock

as

friends and family welcomed TS Empire State VI home.   Now it’s back to classes, study, and tests in this part of the Bronx.

 

Many thanks to Roger and Thomas for use of these photos.

East River Sight to Behold 3

The first six photo here comes from Jonathan Steinman, taken on June 13.  The Donjon tugs has delivered Chesapeake 1000 to a point just off Rockefeller University’s campus to prepare for lifting prefabricated modules for Rockefeller’s River Campus.

Step one for Donjon is to secure the gargantuan crane.

Then Atlantic Salvor moves into place to

receive the massive anchors, a job that Salvor may be IS uniquely qualified to perform.

 

The yellow lighted buoys mark the anchors’ positions.

By the time I got there on June 17, sans camera other than phone, several of the modules had already been lifted from the waterborne transport into the locations where they’ll stay for a very long time.  See time lapse of the installation of modules 1 and 2 on youtube here.

A dozen more modules will still be lifted when

water, tidal, and atmospheric conditions allow.

Click here for more information of the River Campus project, one of many construction sights to behold along the East over.  A calendar of additional lifting can be found here, subject to change.

And many thanks to Jonathan for use of his photos and information about the project.  Next time, I’ll bring my good camera.

Previous sights to behold there can be found here.

And while we’re on the topic of heavy equipment, here’s a vimeo update of of invisible gold project happening off Block Island.  I want to get back there soon.

 

 

Essex-built Schooner and the Huge Gray Haze

With a tip of the hat  to Hildegarde Swift and Lynd Ward, the title that came to mind as I shot these, and you’ll see why by the end.  See the road signs up there intended for drivers on the Triboro Bridge?

Rewarding my wait, it’s Jaguar towing Highlander Sea into the Gate,

past the Ward’s Island Footbridge, and

past Archibald Gracie’s cottage on the point. Click here for peers of the 1978 Jaguar.

Westbound the tow came at almost slack water and past

RTC 104 and

the Twins bound for Riverhead.

More on the brick building there with romanesque windows and green roof at the end of this post.

And here, when they were under the Queensboro Bridge,  the title occurred to me . . . having the same syllabication and cadence as the Swift and Ward title.

Now we need a story, one that starts as hundreds could in tiny but huge Essex.  Click here for my previous posts on Essex.

Maybe one about a fishing schooner design turned pilot boat turned yacht turned school turned . . .

fish market and restaurant/bar in the sixth boro.  I hope they sell monkfish.  These photos are compliments of my brother taken in Zwolle at a

pop-up market.

Thanks bro . . .

All other photos here by Will Van Dorp.

So, thanks to identification by Jonathan Steinman, the brick building there is ConEd’s cogeneration plant at East  74th St.  And this is a digression, but 74th Street has long been quite the interesting place.

East River Sight to Behold 2

The sixth boro tidal strait typical known as the East River, surrounded as it is by impressive urbanity, is nonetheless a significant waterway.  These photos today come from Jonathan Steinman, as did these of Ginga Lion, a 507′ loa vessel.

But Jonathan was surprised–as was I when I got his photos– to see ATB Freeport travel through the strait last week, even though New London, its destination, is closer by the “inside” route than by the alternative outside of Long Island, which it followed on the return.  The tape says the tug is 144′ loa and the barge–Chemical Transporter— is 521.’  While tug and barge are notched, the combined length of the units exceeds that of similar large units operated on this strait by Kirby, Bouchard, and Reinauer.  For what that’s worth.  Here’s some backstory on Freeport‘s costly construction.

Thanks to Jonathan for these photos.

Given today’s date, the reference above to Lion, and the beautiful weather outside in NYC, I need to link to this lamb post from a year and a half ago.

East River Mystery 5

Here are the previous installments.

Rare as it is to see a chemical tanker traverse the East River, there’s no mystery about this vessel’s identity…  Ginga Lion.  For outatowners, the bridge goes by Koch Bridge, 59th Street Bridge, or Queensboro Bridge.

These photos were taken last Wednesday–October 21–by Jonathan Steinman, frequent contributor of photos from along that tidal strait, which is not really a river.

So here’s the mystery . . . or at least the question.  Given the Jones Act, how can this vessel make the stops it does.  On this run, it was traveling from Bayonne to Port Jeff, and as of this writing, she’s on her way to New Orleans. Prior ports of call and dates are as follows:  10/8 Gibraltar, 9/10 Pasir Gudang Malaysia, 9/4 Kuala Tanjung Indonesia, 8/18 Nantong China, 8/17 Zhangiagang China, 6/22 Houston.

Ginga Lion is clearly a foreign flagged chemical tanker.

I suspect the answer is that she’s not transferring cargo from one US port to another, just loading or offloading at a series of US stops, which I understand would be permissible.   Anyone clarify?

Many thanks to Jonathan for keeping eyes on the East River and sending along the question and photos.

 

East River Mystery 4

Here are previous posts in this series.

And this set comes from Mike Abegg, whose photos have been used here previously.   Check this out.  All I know about the yellow vessel is that it looks like a Griffon 1000TD.

Anyone know the whences and whose . . . inquiring minds wish to know.

Thanks to Mike for sharing these photos.

Somewhat related . . . does anyone you know refer to the East River or any portion of it as the Sound River?