Second Lives 10

Huron Service used to be Eric Candies.  Look at the lines of her hull and house.   Do they

look like these on Na Hoku?  No surprise . . . Na Hoku used to be Chris Candies.  At least a half dozen other ex-Candies boats work as regulars in the sixth boro.

Now look at the barge on Na Hoku‘s hip.  DBL 85 used to be

Freedom.   Stuff doesn’t change that much;  it just gets renamed.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

And this just in from Birk, another fleet sib, Sandmaster, (ex-Ben Candies).  You recently saw this angle wet here on tugster.

Cheers.

Hornbeck Outside Boro6

All fotos today come compliments of John van der Doe, who resides north of the border.     John’s set, all taken over a three-hour period this past Saturday (4/9)  seem to flow naturally from the Hornbeck post I did almost two years ago here.  If you’re a regular reader, you’ll recognize that Eagle Service was the tug involved in a bump in Hell Gate less than a month ago.  John’s  fotos answer some questions:  where are vessels of all sorts coming from as they traverse the sixth boro?  Where are they headed?  Any guesses where John took these fotos?

Here’s a clue.

He caught them upbound on the Welland Canal; upbound meaning heading from Lake Ontario to Lake Erie.

And if that weren’t enough, midafternoon brought on

Huron Service.

Makes me wonder about things like final destination,  length of hitch here, other economics of  such a trip . . . .

Thanks very much to John van der Doe for these fotos.

Random Tugs 66

Featured many times on this blog:  McAllister Responder (ex-Exxon Empire State, Empire State) launched in 1967 in Jacksonville.  Note the deckhand’s communication.  If my info is correct, then ghosts

live there today.  Here’s a haunting timeline and set of b/w fotos.  That’s tanker Lian An Hu in the background.

Weeks tug Robert (ex-Emily S, 1982) stands by Crane Barge 532 in midstream off the Financial District, awaiting more “erosion mats.”

Austin Reinauer (1978, ex-Mobil 5, Morania No. 1, Tamarac) heads across from the KVK toward Erie Basin.

Jill Reinauer (1967, ex-Ranger)  southbound past Ellis Island, the place the Lenape knew as Kioshk . . . or Gull Island.

Peter F. Gellatly (delivered just over a year ago)  heads in the same direction as Jill Reinauer.

Eagle Service (ex-Grant Candies, 1996) and crabber Alexa J off the wintry dunes of  “Konstapel’s Hoeck.”

Jakobson-built, 1967   Ruby M, ex-Texaco Fire Chief, pushing fuel barge Fire Island.  Now if you didn’t know this to be the name of local geography, wouldn’t such a name as “fire island” make you nervous?

Lincoln Sea, used to be blue, anchored off Red Hook a few days ago.  Off to the left, Moran barge Massachusetts anchors.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Delaware Tugs 3

Uh … transplant to the Delaware?

Wilmington Tug’s Sonie passes junk-rigged Summer Wind as

she pushes light in the direction of the Ben Franklin Bridge.  In the foreground left is the faux sternwheel of Philadelphia Belle.

Gulf Service heads in the same direction from over near the big guns of battleship New Jersey.

That transplant …  It launched from Philadephia in 1902 to work out of New York, which it did until 1939.  See the fourth profile below. 

Petrel is an Allied staple on the Delaware.

Jupiter (ex-Socony #14) currently is operated and maintained by a volunteer group called Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild.  The tip of boom and yellow-green-white vessel belong to Gazela, the Guild’s other vessel, previously written about here and here (See fotos 7, 8 and 9).   

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Equinox 4

My intended title here was something like “….so I thought I’d get out early this morning and take some fotos of the harvest moon setting, but the morning arrived all foggy in the sixth boro…”  but that would have been been too long, even though everything I just said is true.

Practically the first thing I saw on the KVK this morning intrigued me, after a summer of seeing houses, bridges, and  more*

I wondered.  It looked like an industrial park building was eastbound on the KVK.  Hunt Girls:  the boat name charmed me too, since it sounded like the message the “voice in my head” first told me when I was an early teenager…  to talk with them, of course.  Imagine a work vessel named “cherchez les femmes.”  Vane’s Bohemia had a rumble seat view of the tow.

I wondered what other tows might be forthcoming:  foggy days–as Stephen King knows well–always usher in the unlikeliest visitors.

*More earlier includes the power plant ventilators that Bowsprite captured below earlier this week.  It looks like either Crow or Cheyenne and Margot.

St Andrew–the sixth boro’s resident Oregonian– never quite caught my attention as it did today, seen here full frontal.

Out of the mist came Donal G McAllister, usually based in Baltimore.  By the way, I finally tracked down Rosemary McAllister;  it seems she runs for G & H Towing,  a Houston company,  now under the name  Rosemary.

Here, in close quarters, APL Arabia is flanked by Barbara McAllister and Thomas D Witte.

Alexandra, the LaFarge barge, is positioned by Turecamo Girls alongside and Mary Turecamo, in notch.

Timothy L Reinauer and Ellen McAllister wore a conspiratorial air as they held this formation westward along the KVK.

Huron Service passes an unidentified safety-colored survey boat a half mile east of the Bayonne Bridge.

I later learned that I would have heard and then seen OSG Vision if I’d stayed at the Kill for another half hour.  Oh well, then I would have missed this terrestrial apparition below.  This intimidating sight pulled up behind me in Elizabeth, NJ yesterday as I went in to work!!!  Why on earth would a battlefield-ready Ford 550 bear NJ plates and cruise that modest-size greater sixth-boro landing!?

I wondered if I’d slipped into the twilight zone in which maybe this blog and my Babylonian Captivity one had merged, as in dreams, especially ones during a full moon.

But I made it back to tell the tale and post the fotos…  Will Van Dorp.

Nothing was injured while researching or writing this, but I did discover a kindred Flickr account.

Views of Bayonne

Before these views of the bridge at Bayonne, two quick reminders:  1) the drum calls to the big parade less than a handful days away, and 2) the voting for caption contest #2 takes just a few seconds.  Do it, please.

A half year ago, you saw views of Outerbridge;   what unifies these fotos is the most beautiful bridge over the sixth boro that now threatens to stifle the sixth boro as well as the other five.  When the Bayonne opened in 1931, it set the mark as the longest steel arch bridge in the world.  Similarly, the foto below (looking to the southwest from central Brookln, over Red Hook, and toward the Bayonne)  was taken from 44 Court Street in Brooklyn, which in 1901 was the tallest building in Brooklyn.   Certainly, it’s a most enviable view of the sixth boro I’ve seen in a while.

I have a request at the end of this post.

Supply vessel Sorensen Miller distances itself from the Bridge on a foggy May day.

Falcon leaves it behind as it enters the Buttermilk Channel.

Shannon Dann heads farther southwest of it.

Patriot Service pushes a fuel barge toward it for refill.

Scott Turecamo, locked 60 feet into the notch of fuel barge New Hampshire, uses its 5100 hp to drive the unit toward the Bridge.  To the left is Cape Cod, which first appeared here two and a half years ago.

A light and curvaceous Timothy L. Reinauer steams toward the yard on this side of the Bridge.

Help me out here:  an unidentified tug (a Great Lakes Dredge & Dock boat?)  pushes a scow (with Boston registry?)  toward the KVK beyond the Bridge.  Foto taken in 2008.

From the same Elizabeth (NJ) perspective, unidentified tug and tanker collaborate so that one may head for sea.

Bayonne, the Bridge too low for the future . . .  what will it look like in 10 years?

My request:  send me your views of the Bayonne Bridge, the more unusual, the better.  I’m proudest of the second shot above, as the tower of 44 Court is a special place.  Send me your unusual shots and we’ll reprise this topic.

All fotos here by Will Van Dorp.

Unrelated but very notable:  Check out this memorial post for the first CGC Escanaba, which made the supreme sacrifice 67 years ago last weekend.