Requiem 2

1997.  Taken from QE2 as it overtakes a Moran tug  . . .

 

 

taken some days later as the QE2 returns, passing the Towers at dawn…

while possibly the same Moran tug meets it again.

May 1998.  Bounty arrives.

May 2000.  Morgan Reinauer passes lower Manhattan in the fog.

January 11, 2001.  Peggy Sheridan, now Apex’s  Brooklyn, passes on a cold winter day.

Places, as with people, you never know when you’ll see them the last time.  Steve wrote me once that he passed the Towers on September 2, 2001 on the way to the tugboat race starting line.  He looked at the Towers, but didn’t take out his camera …   because he’d taken so many photos of the Towers before.  I fully understand.  

I can’t say I remember my breakfast that morning or getting onto my LIRR at 05:17 that morning in Seaford, as I always did, with folks I always saw then  . . .

but I’d never see them again, because they worked in that building.

I know it’s the same for folks who’d come on watch a few hours earlier that morning with one set of orders, and then before 0900 were faced with this.

Hat tip to Joel Milton for this account of his day just about 20 years ago.  Workboat has republished in November 2001 account.   From ProfessionalMariner, here are some links.

RIP.

All photos supplied by Steve Munoz.

 

Requiem 1

August 2021.  Samatha Miller follows the channel just north of the Staten Island Yankees stadium.  Note today’s skyline.

1970.  The rest of these photos I share thanks to Steve Munoz. Note the early night skyline here shows the Towers under construction.

1970 Dalzelleagle in the Buttermilk Channel passing USCG cutters tied up alongside Governors Island.  Dalzelleagle, a 1958 Jakobson product, later became McAllister Bros, which was scrapped earlier this year.   In a comment in an earlier post, Tony A identifies one of the cutters as the storied USCG Dallas (WHEC-716), now BRP Ramon Alcaraz (PS-16),  pride of the Philippines Navy.

1971.  McAllister Bros southbound in the Upper Bay.

1971.  The aircraft looks to be amphibious.  Anyone help?  I’d say that’s a Kennedy-class ferry,  And at the foot of the Tower, note the fireboats tied up at Pier A, occupied by FDNY from 1960 until 1992.

1973.  SS Olympia headed for sea.  Her career spanned 1953 until 2009, when she was beached in Alang.

1973.  McAllister Bros. northbound off Hoboken.

1973.  Dalzellera.  That makes her 58 years old at this point.

1973. Concordia Gulf bound for sea. 

1985.  Statue scaffolded for repairs.

1992.  As seen from a ship on Newark Bay at dawn.

1992.  Kerry Moran seven years before her wheelhouse and propulsion were reconfigured.

Many thanks to Steve for sharing these photos, pre-dating my time here.  I moved to the area and started working in Brooklyn in 2000.

It should go without saying what the focus here is.  More to come. Here‘s what I posted exactly 10 years ago, when it seems to me, we were still a united people sharing common losses and goals.

June 2, 1973 Aftermath

The 1968-built  Chemical Pioneer is a long- and multiple-lived vessel.  Here‘s a photo of her, then known as C. V. Sea Witch, in 1970.  She entered history books in the sixth boro on the night of June 1 into 2, 1973, most of you likely know the story of her tragic encounter, fatal for 16 mariners, collision and subsequent fire with SS Esso Brussels, loaded with Nigerian crude. Fire engulfed both ships and as they dragged anchor under the VZ Bridge, threatened the integrity of the bridge.

Thanks to Steve Munoz, here are photos of Esso Brussels taken several months later

at the Todd Shipyard in Hoboken, which closed two years later, part of a cascade of lost shipyards in the sixth boro.

Later that year she was towed to Greece, where she was rebuilt and emerged from the shipyard in 1974 as Petrola XVII.  She carried the name Petrola--with various number suffixes–until she was scrapped in 1985.

 

Here’s the rebuilt C. V. Sea Witch, now called Chemical Pioneer.

 

Many thanks for these photos to Steve Munoz, who had been aboard McAllister Bros. with his uncle Capt. Bob Munoz.  I could have called this “Thanks to Steve Munoz 20.”

Unfortunately, the disaster of early June 1973 has not been the only one in sixth boro history.  NY Tugmaster’s Weblog devotes a post to some of these, with three most horrific ones occurring in the month of June.  Many thanks to Capt. Brucato for compiling these with links to the final reports.

Interestingly, the hull of PS General Slocum was converted to a coal barge, and it sank in December 1911.  Texaco Massachusetts was towed to a shipyard,  repaired,  and returned to service, as were two attending tugboats, Latin American and Esso Vermont.  Dramatic photos of the Texaco Massachetts/Alva Cape post-collision fire and rescue efforts can be seen here. Alva Cape was eventually towed 150 miles SE of the Narrows and sunk.

Thanks to Steve Munoz 19

From August 20, 1973 . . . it’s another narrated job from Steve. This time, MS Olympia is getting sailed.   Launched in 1953 in Glasgow, she was a long-lived vessel.  Any guesses when she went out of service?

“MS Olympia at 57th St Pier North R.  Eugene F Moran and  Maureen Moran wait on the river side of the pier.”

I gather Eugene was the 1951 Jakobson-build, the ninth and final tug by that name.  Maureen worked under that name from 1971 until 2010.

“Our vantage point was “McA Bros.”

“McAllister Bros.  pushing the bow of MS Olympia.  ”

 

“MS Olympia heading for sea.”  Off her port bow, you can see the tall building at Stevens Institute of Technology.

Lower Manhattan on the North River side was truly a different place in 1973.    Have you guessed when this vessel went out of service?  You can read her service history and see lots of photos, some even in the sixth boro, here.

One job done, on to the next for McAllister Bros.  By the way, anyone know why the flag is at half mast?  My search came up empty handed.

And the answer is . . . 2009.  She was beached in Alang on 24 July 2009 and nothing was left a year later.  Her last visit in NYC had been in 2001.

 

Random Tugs 289

But first, can you guess the date?  Answer follows.

Mackenzie Rose is the newest name for this 2000-built boat, after Vernon C and then Mary Gellatly.

Ellen, ex-YTB-793 Piqua, here assists a box boat with a boat on top.   Ex-YTBs can be found in some unusual places.

Capt. Brian A. approaches the pilot’s door of this ULCV.

Jay Michael is painted a flat red, or maybe that’s a faded bright red.

Mount St Elias heads east with a loaded DBL 82.

Robert IV is off to a job.

Anacostia goes out the Ambrose with Double Skin 509A on wire.

Sea Lion returns, as does

Lincoln Sea and DBL 140 arrive from the south.

And finally, James D and Miriam meet a box ship to escort her into port.

Did you guess the date of the McAllister Bros. photo?  It comes thanks to Steve Munoz, who sent more along as well.  The answer is 1973, and the photo is taken from the Hoboken side.

All photos, except Steve’s, by Will Van Dorp.

Unrelated but interesting:  How one small town grocery store in Alaska keeps the shelves stocked here.   More southern Alaska boat infrastructure here.