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Sometimes I’m conflicted about what to post, like today with too many competing stories, and we’ll start with news, and Cisne Branco, which translates as “white swan.” The photo below shows Cisne Branco, a Brazilian Navy training vessel, in the sixth boro in May 2012 for a sixth boro OpSail event. Earlier this week, the 1998 vessel got swept downstream the Rio Guayas in Guayaquil, Ecuador and came to rest against a pedestrian bridge. See it and hear about it here.
Here’s another shot of Cisne Branco in Gravesend Bay.
In other news, the 1967 83′ steel schooner Mystic Whaler, a regular in the sixth boro, has been sold to a party on the West Coast. The Egintons have owned it since 1995.
A few weeks ago now, the 1943 laker Mississagi was towed to the scrapyard in Sault Ste Marie. I caught these two photos of her in summer 2016 in Lake Michigan below and
along the Saint Lawrence River below. Other photos can be seen here.
While looking up my May 2012 photos of Cisne Branco, I saw this photo of Taurus in the North River. She’s now Joker, featured here several times recently. In May 2012, the K-Sea fleet had just been sold to Kirby, and in the photo below, the red K-Sea visor was painted blue, the K-Sea logo was removed from the stack, but the Kirby logo had not yet replaced it. Also, in the background, it’s Harvey and Frying Pan at Pier 66.
This photo also from May 2012 shows Ellen McAllister coming alongside Dewarucci, an Indonesian training ship. Between the two, it’s Scotty Sky, the small bunker tanker now sold somewhere in the Cabibbean.
Since there’s a lot of media attention on the congestion in SOME US ports, have a look at what’s off Savannah. This was a screen grab from VesselFinder almost a week ago, and it’s not much different today. A personal frustration is the outermost vessel shown, CMA CGM Marco Polo. I missed getting a photo of her in the sixth boro on Saturday, October 9 because I was out of town; in the wee hours of Monday, she departed for Norfolk and then Savannah. She’s now been anchored, about 60 miles out from Savannah’s container terminals since the 15th. Earlier this year she was setting a new record in US/Canada ports, and now she’s stuck in a jam.
And finally, two photos from April 2018 showing Mon Lei getting towed to a marina just north of the GW Bridge, where it stayed for some time. Question: Where is Mon Lei today . . . asking for a friend.
This red/white junk was once quite the fixture in the sixth boro, and although I was never aboard, I’m told the interior was sumptuous! Click here for posts I’ve done on the boat. I talked with one of the owners once on the phone.
That’s some news from my desk in Queens. All photos, WVD.
I’d really like to know what became of Mon Lei.
Here’s something to celebrate: the 90th anniversary of fireboat John J. Harvey. There’s a party, and you can get your tickets here.
From the 1931fireboat.org site, the fireboat was “the boat was launched in Brooklyn on October 6, 1931. and commissioned on December 17..” with many superlatives “the first fireboat powered by internal combustion engines and the first that could pump and maneuver simultaneously… the largest, fastest fire fighting machine of her time, capable of pumping 18,000 gallons per minute, roughly the equivalent of 20 terrestrial fire trucks. The innovations of her design influenced all subsequent fireboats.”
Who was John J. Harvey? “Firefighter John J. Harvey was pilot of the steam fireboat Thomas Willett. In February 1930 a fire broke out aboard the North German Lloyd Lines ship Muenchen. Willett came alongside and her crew started working aboard the burning ship. The fire could not be contained and a series of massive explosions rocked Muenchen. The largest explosion sent a section of steel plate through the pilot house of Willett, killing Pilot Harvey instantly. All except for John J. Harvey survived the disaster. John J. Harvey was the first New York City fireboat named after a member of the department.
In early October 1937 Mayor Fiorello inaugurated the two-way radio system, linking all nine FDNY fireboats.
The Harvey/Normandie story is complex; even more so is the Harvey/World Trade Center story.
FDNY retired her in 1995, and “placed up for auction and bought by her present owners on February 11, 1999.” Note the condition of her starboard propeller in drydock in 2000. Refurbished, she made her first voyage on August 4, 1999. She performed and pumped well, signaling the first of many new trips as a preserved historic vessel.
She appears in many maritime festivals outside NYC, as here in Oyster Bay, and
here at the Waterford Tugboat Roundup.
To close out, here are some of my photos of Harvey, dazzled in memory of the camouflaged vessels of WW1.
She not only looks good: she also moves, her bow slicing through the river as here in September 2013.
I once rode as guest on Harvey years ago . . . July 4, 2009, from Manhattan to Poughkeepsie, as reported here.
Happy b’day and long may she sail.
It’s hard to believe, but I’ve not been to the Great North River Tugboat Race since 2014, but in normal times, September 5 would see the next race. But we’ve dispensed with the “normal times” concept for the time being.
In selecting the batch for this post, I wanted splash, froth, bubbles, and the effervescence the river can react with when tons of steel and thousands of horsepower push through the ever changing water. The next two photos are from that 2014 race.
It was overcast during the race, but an hour or so later, when pushing contests were happening and
the wakes flattened out and we sized up USAV MGen. Anthony Wayne, patches of blue appeared. I should leave you in suspense about how this push went. Let me put it this way; they left town not long after the push-off.
2013 was an equally overcast day, and again, not to identify every tugboat in that lineup, it appears that W. O. Decker has either jumped the gun or activated its jet drive and will soon rise up out of the Hudson on her hydrofoil assists. I’d guess the latter.
See what I told you . . . Decker has gone so far ahead that it’s already over the horizon.
Second lap maybe for Decker?
It’s starting to appear that in 2012, as in ’13 and ’14, it was overcast.
It was great to see Buchanan 12, usually burdened with a half dozen stone barges, disencumbered and frothing up the river. That’s the 1907 Pegasus back there too.
In 2011, I was able to get a photo of the racing craft along with sky spray by one of the fireboats present, likely 343. What’s remarkable comparing the photo above with the one below is the color of the water; hurricane Irene had dropped a lot of rain upstate and all the tributaries sent that into the Hudson with tribute in the form of silt.
Quantico Creek and Maurania III did an excellent job of stirring up the water.
But again, it was overcast and hazy over silty water.
However, in 2010, we had blue skies that really accentuated the DonJon boats like Cheyenne and
the harbor colossus, Atlantic Salvor.
In 2009, there were wispy clouds, allowing the “queen of the day” to be Ellen McAllister. But look who else showed up!!!!
Urger. Urger would EASILY have won the race, but she was doing what she does best . . . urging all the other boats and crews to be fleeter than she, holding herself back, allowed herself to be that day.
All photos and commentary, WVD. See you at the races in 2022.
The “4” here refers to the dry dock, not the fourth post in this series. The last post on Caddell was Something Different 57. And in the “high and dry” series, this would be number 11. I’m just trying to anchor this post in the previous body of work. Also, I believe this dry dock was originally built as an auxilliary floating dry dock (ARD) by the USN to lift submarines out of their watery habitat, but I can’t corroborate that.
In Dry Dock 4 a half dozen years ago was the pilot boat New York. I put this first so that the vessels in the rest of the photos can be compared against a standard, the dimensions of the same dry dock.
See above for scale. On this date, winter 2014, Dry Dock 4 was shared by W. O. Decker and schooner Pioneer, currently both in Albany getting refurbished and improved.
This boat’s a mystery to me; the livery on upper pilothouse says it’s a Reinauer boat, but I took this photo over 10 years ago and have lost track of its identity. You may know?
McAllisters Brothers was originally called Dalzelleagle. I believe it’s currently in the sixth boro but mothballed.
The Fireboat John J. Harvey had some work done in Dry Dock 4 . She has a long and storied career.
Doris Moran is a 4610 hp tugboat that does some sixth boro work, although she’s currently in Louisiana.
East Coast has not appeared on this blog very often. She used to tow the sugar barge, and she may well still do so.
Let’s get to the end of this post with Clipper City, having some bottom work done on a cold winter’s day eight years ago already.
All photos, WVD, who’d love to know more about the history of Dry Dock 4.
Let’s do 2013 and 2014, or redo them, same conditions as I stated yesterday. But first let’s look at the 2013 crowd, packing in like you wouldn’t with covid. Here was the crowd at 1010 and
by 1035 they had grown significantly.
The compulsory muster takes place, irrigated by fireboat John J. Harvey.
Once the race begins, a front-runner like Decker
might soon get left in the wake.
The fire boat slices up from behind and
propels itself between two Miller boats.
Pushoffs happen next, sometimes quite equally matched like here, with 3900 hp countering 4200.
Let’s jump ahead to 2014, with the arrivals on the watery carpet,
the processing to the starting line,
and get straight to racing without all the preening and posturing.
Someone seems a bit oversize in that gray livery.
This is a fairly mis-matched pair: Wayne at 5100 hp, and Ellen at 4000. Maybe a re-match is in order Wayne v. Ava.
Thanks to Jeff Anzevino for this shot, the Media Boat has military background in common with Wayne.
After Wayne has strutted its stuff in the push-offs, some of the boats lined up for the roping the bollard.
Let’s hold it up here. All photos, WVD.
Heraclitus has to be the classical philosopher most referred to on this blog. I thought of this person again as I returned into the city after my longest ever so far time away; this is a familiar place of six boros, and yet it does not seem familiar. It is new, renewed by multiple sunrises and by my recollection as I gallivanted afar, seeing new places. We enter beneath the GW, which I’ve never seen lit up this way.
On the water side of a wild and dynamic clutch of architecture, Pegasus stands guard,
As we make an initial run to the Upper Bay, we pass a renewed Harvey, a resolute Frying Pan, and an ever working Chandra B.
Hunting Creek follows Chandra B up to the cruise terminal.
USCGC Shrike waits near FDNY’s Hudson River station and the sprouting Pier 55.
Ernest Campbell brings more fuel to the cruise terminal.
Sarah Ann (I believe) delivers waste, passing the Battery, where Clipper City awaits another day of passengers.
As we circled back to dock, an unfamiliar tug was southbound.
Robert T and that livery are not ones I recognized, until
I realized this was the old Debora Miller. Who knew!!??
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
This is an unexpected post, but I watched a movie the other day that involved D.S. 78 barge moving garbage away from a marine transfer station
somewhere in Manhattan. John J. Harvey shows up in the movie. And the crewman above, would he be crew or an actor?
And here’s the tug. Likely someone seeing this can identify it, but I can’t. Anyone help? And which transfer station would this be, given the docks and other structures on the other shore? My guess is north of the current passenger terminal, and that’s a maritime Hoboken on the other side.
And which movie was this?
Here’s your last chance to guess. The biggest clue you’re getting here is garbage and mention multiple times of black-n-white glossy photos, unlike these.
The movie involved some young people getting arrested for dumping garbage in the wrong place.
Got it?
Alice’s Restaurant! You can spend two hours watching the whole movie, or zoom to about an hour and twelve minutes in and you’ll see the scene.
Schooner Ambergris came in from sea in mid-April, but I still don’t know anything more about her. Anyone help?
Dolphin is truly a yacht; it’s also likely a winter yacht down south. Up north, we see vessels like this seasonally. I can’t identify the burgee on the bow.
Schooner Pioneer, launched 1885!!, has never been a yacht, but in its current much-loved state, it operates only in the warmer half of the year and it’s an excursion vessel.
Passing the Hoboken/NJ Transit terminal, that unnamed trawler is truly a yacht coming north for the summer.
Care for a summer evening on a Chicago Grebe-built yacht? Here’s the info on yacht Full Moon departures out of North Cove. If you want a full day’s amusement online, you could investigate these other Grebe-built yachts . . . . Or you could read about this Chicago shipyard and many other topics in this great blog called Industrial History, which I’ve just added to my blogroll.
Sometimes the Erie Canal seems devoid of vessel traffic, but on this day at Lock 17, there were plenty of takers. As I recall, these cruisers were from Texas, Michigan, Florida, and California!
By the boat name and the VHF manner as I overheard it, I can guess the previous employment of this vessel operator.
Yesterday I went to this location to meet a friend over beer and crab cakes, my first there in quite a while . . . . But if you’ve never hung out at Pier 66, you owe to yourself. Advice . . . if you want a seat, go on the off hours! It’s been way too long ago that this gathering happened there.
And although I took this photo in the fall, the reminder is clear: be safe.
All photos and sentiments by Will Van Dorp.
It’s that time again . . . a glance back at exactly a decade ago. Back in June 2009, the 400th anniversary of the Half Moon going up the Hudson kicked off with a 20th century version of the Half Moon going up the Hudson. Note the banner hung to the old TZ Bridge along the right side of the photo. That replica is now in the Netherlands, looking for a new home, and that bridge–parts of it–have become fish structure somewhere off Long Island.
A newish boat in town was Peter F. Gellatly, now Vane’s Long Island.
Bounty–alas her fate–was still an irregular visitor to the sixth boro. Here she’s made up to Harvey just outboard of Frying Pan.
Brian Nicholas moves a scrap barge out of the East River.
Paul T. Moran made one of her really rare visits to the sixth boro.
Container vessels calling in the ports of NY and NJ had not yet become UL . . . ultra large versions
Harvey follows Half Moon northbound on the Hudson.
Michigan Service and Erie Service gather near IMTT.
Sisters assists with a tanker, and
here’s more of the River Day procession marking the year of Half Moon the first.
All photos taken in June 2009 by Will Van Dorp.
Two massive but indistinct enterprises loom offshore while a ketch motors in. I understand that if I were near to one of those “loomers” . . . they’d be moving faster than I could swim, row, paddle, or walk . . . .
I couldn’t identify the ketch, with the ever-ready bike on deck.
What time is it?
Time to watch the colossal screen? I’m trying to imagine some applications . . . circle the boats at the float-in cinema? harbor church service? a candidate’s debate? a floating classroom?
Only today did I understand that Harvey‘s paint treatment was part of a World War 1 memorial called 14-18 Now.
Click here for 14-18 Now background, leading up to the November 11, 2018 centennial remembrance of the end of the war that was supposed to end all wars . . . . Even Richard Thompson, one of my favorite singer-songwriters, put out related music.
I NEED to now the story here, this 1930s wrecker on a pier in Red Hook . . . Will that be loaded onto a ship and sent away? I hope not. Related . . . I’ve got fodder for another truckster post soon.
Over in Sunset Park (or is this already Bay Ridge??), are these the legs for the Staten Island Wheel that will never stand?
All photos and questions by Will Van Dorp.
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