Helen’s Last Waltz Redux

If it seems I’m doing a lot of redux, etc. these days, my explanation is that 2012 was a great time for my being out there taking photos.  It was entirely by chance that I walked past this scene on July 17, 2012 before 0900.  I can’t even remember why I was there.  Now it matters no more because as soon as I saw this, scuttlebutt told me what was happening.  A towline on Helen‘s stern after all those years meant

she was moving.  I raced around Peking to get a different perspective.   She was indeed being towed out and made fast to the car float with the green spud.

I saw McAllister Responder there, but I had’t figured out why, yet.

After spinning around (does Decker have z-drives?!!)  [just kidding], deckhand made up head to head with Helen on Decker‘s port side, and

began to move astern.

At the same time, Responder crawled astern on the far side of the opening.  Now it wasn’t until today, studying these photos, that I noticed the crewman about midships on the stern deck.  Would that have been the late Capt. Brian?

But as I said, I hadn’t noticed that person until today. He shows up in another photo. 

Once Decker had Helen out of the “anchorage” enough that Responder could take Helen alongside, Decker threw off her lines and

 Responder took over as dance partner for the the 1900 Helen. Notice the crewman on the stern deck?

Away they went on

might have been Helen‘s last transit of the Buttermilk channel.

All photos, WVD, who last posted photos of Helen here half a year ago.

One of the photos from this July 2022 event was memorialized here, I’m happy to report.

 

Retro Sixth Boro 36

April 1, 2011 … and this was not a joke.  More on this distressed vessel at the end of this post.

McCormack Boys and

Turecamo Girls with Barney Turecamo.  All three are still working in the same liveries, I believe.

Long Island-built Escort was phased out as a certain coal-fired power plant shut down.  She’s taken on new life as Northstar Innovator, based on NJ’s

Maurice River, although I’ve yet to see her. 

Stad Amsterdam is not currently in Amsterdam;  she’s not far away though in Scheveningen.  If you want to pronounce this shibboleth as a Dutch speaker would, have a listen. 

Spring sunrises . . .  Coming into port is the 2017-scrapped Atlantic Cartier

escorted by Ellen McAllister and

passing Bow Clipper and Maria J.  That tug is now Nicholas Vinik. Bow Clipper is now in Santos Brasil. 

The venerable Chemical Pioneer was ushered in by Ellen McAllister and McAllister Responder. I say “venerable” because she was built using the stern of Sea Witch, after a massive conflagration in the port, told here by the Fire Fighter site.   .

Two small USMMA boats made their way through the fog.   I’m not sure the name of the vessel to the left, but the one to the right was Growler and she’s back (though hidden away) in the sixth boro.

Of course, I post a photo of Kristin Poling, which had only a few months of service left at this point. She started service in 1934 as Poughkeepsie Socony.

Marion M . . . I’ve been told she was sold to parties in the Chesapeake who planned to restore her and put her up for sale in 2018.  Does anyone have an update on that?

And finally, we return to Le Papillon . . .  the 48′ steel schooner was dragged off the beach but I lost track of her after that.  I believe she was cut up.

It all seems like stuff from long ago . .    all photos, WVD.

Retro Sixth Boro 35 C

March 25, 2011 was a busy day.  L to r, Maurania III, USNS Yano, Resolute, McAllister Responder, McAllister Girls, Amy Moran . . . with a K-Sea barge at the mooring, and some iconic structures.  None of these vessels in currently in the sixth boro.  Amy Moran is now John Joseph.

Let’s follow the USNS vessel first, as it’s assisted into the graving dock.  Yano is in Newport News at this time, 2021. 

Yano is an example of a US-flagged non-Jones Act vessel.

A bit later, more to the west, Davis Sea stands by to assist Taurus

and DBL 25 into a dock.  Taurus recently came to the boro from Philly as Joker.  Davis Sea is now Defender. 

The following day, Maurania III and

McAllister Girls sail British Serenity off the dock. Maurania III is now in Wilmington, and British Serenity is now Champion Timur and is in the Black Sea on a voyage that began in Indonesia.  Girls is laid up.

An hour later, Jennifer Turecamo assisted the big OSG 350 moved by

OSG Vision westbound.  Jennifer is in Tampa, and Vision runs in and out of Delaware Bay.

All photos and any errors, WVD, who notices the old Bayonne Bridge profile above.

For an update on Ever Given, click here.

And the answer to yesterday’s what and where:  Jay Michael off Bridgeport, CT….

Random Ships 75

Odfjell tankers of this and recent generations all look the same, so since I was able to get only the name, you can conjure up the rest.  Bow Chain here was departing NYC and is currently in Houston.  Previously, Bow Chain appeared on this blog here. Previous Odfjell tankers in the sixth boro include Bow __ (Cecil, Clipper, Fortune, Hector, Jubail, Performer, Riyad, Sirius, Summer, Trajectory).  This time it’s in need of some Bow PAINT!

Seaways Silvermar the other day was being lightered, while anchored across the channel from “dem five.”  No really . . . the DEM FIVE vessel there

was Alice Star.  Dem Five is a new fleet–actually managed by Lydia Star— for me.   Maybe it’s time I dust off the “names” series.

Erato is one of the smaller container vessels that call at the Red Hook port, and mostly Caribbean ports.  I know I’ve seen her before, but this is the first time she appears on tugster, I believe.  As of this writing, she’s already shuttling back north from Jamaica.

Since we’re nearing the end of a decade–and weather has not been conducive to getting out for photos–here’s a glance back to December 2009 . . . and an unfortunately blurry pic of President Polk, escorted out by McAllister Responder.

The 1988 APL ship, built in Germany in 1988, was 400′ shorter than the largest and now commonplace ULCVs now calling here and that carry about 10,000 (!!!) more containers.

She caught my attention here 10 years ago because of these unusual parts of her cargo, shipping out.

 

She was beached at Chittagong for scrapping in summer 2013.

All photos, even the blurry one, by Will Van Dorp.

 

Retro Sixth Boro 19

i.e., the 19th month in a row that I’ve posted photos from exactly 120 months before.  Well, although it’s not always this hazy, the Statue still looks the same, but

Responder no longer carries that boom or works in the sixth boro, and neither that bridge nor Coho looks the same.

Coral Sea Queen has been reconfigured into a trillion recombined molecules, and

June K is no longer orange.

That part of the skyline is the same–maybe–but Lil Rip has not been in this harbor in quite a while.

This Rosemary is no longer here nor painted this way, and

John Reinauer . . . I’d love to see her since she transited the Atlantic to work in the Gulf of Guinea.

Flinterborg released these Dutch sailing barges in the waterways of another continent . . . and Flinterborg has not returned that I know of.

Penn No. 4 is laid up, I think.  Does no one use the term “mothballed” any more?  I’ve never mothballed clothes, for what that’s worth.

Laura K Moran works in Savannah, with occasional TDY in other ports, I’ve noticed..

All photos by Will Van Dorp, who himself is no longer the same person he was in October 2009.

Retro Sixth Boro 13

April 2009 . . . a decade ago but it’s still palpable and present.

How could I not remember the morning before work I stood on the Elizabethport dock wishing the punch-in clock mechanism would slow to a pace slower than McAllister Responder and McAllister Sisters helping Eagle Boston ooze toward her Linden berth . . .   Some who don’t take many photos might not be able to fathom how those moments stick to the memory.

Or the unmistakeable Norwegian Sea light and going for fuel near IMTT .  . at dawn;  it’s unforgettable.   I was hoping there’d no delays on the rest of my way to work that morning.

Another day, I took lunch break in Elizabethport, thrilled that Laura K and Margaret were escorting Seoul Express away from Howland Hook . . ..  backing her down.

And here’s one . . . I recall my pain this morning as I walked north along HRP, conflicted between the hurt of betrayal and the chill of being under-dressed, since I’d crept out early on a Saturday morning thinking that sun in April translated into warmth ..  . and the throaty sound of Melvin E. Lemmerhirt distracted me from all those things.

Also from that dock in Elizabethport, I watched Rosemary McAllister and Responder ease Hyundai Voyager boat toward the dock in Howland Hook . . .

The scene here is harder to recall, but from l to r, it’s Nathan E. Stewart, New River, and –the uniquely named– Gramma Lee T Moran . . .!

In April 2009, I commuted into work early a lot,so that I could catch the likes of this . . . John Reinauer moving a barge southbound on the Arthur Kill… not knowing that a few years later, that equipment would travel across to the South Atlantic.

Scott Turecamo . . .  this is the only photo in this “oldies” set that could have been taken in 2019 as easily as in 2009, except I’d have to photoshop in the current Manhattan skyline in the distance . . .

All photos by Will Van Dorp, who hopes he’s still fit to add to the archives in 2029 . . .

Retro Sixth Boro 9

I’m rushing December, but I’m eager to get through winter and back to spring.  All photos here date from December 2008.

Bowsprite took this from one of her cliff niches:  June K (2003) here is moving the Floating Hospital  (1974, Blount) up to the Rondout, where she remains. Is she really now called Industria at Sea.

The geography is unchanged, but McAllister Responder (1967) is no longer in the sixth boro, and Sea Venture (1972) is dead and likely scrapped . . . .

Maryland (1962) has become Liz Vinik, after operating with Maryland in the name for more than a handful of companies.

Choptank (2006) is back in the sixth boro and environs.  My autocorrect always wants to call this tug Shoptalk.  Puzzling.  NYK Daedalus (2007) is still at work, just not here.  TEN Andromeda is still on the oceans as well, still transporting crude.

Now called Charly and working the Gulf of Guinea, Janice Ann Reinauer (1967) used to be a personal icon in the sixth boro. Note that 1 World Trade does not appear in this photo, as it would today.

Closing this out . . .  Margaret Moran (1979 and the 4th boat by that name) passes APL Jade (1995 and likely scrapped by now) in the KVK.

I’m hoping you’re enjoying this glances back a decade as much as I am.

With the exception of the first photo, all these by Will Van Dorp, who alone is responsible for research errors.

Unrelated:  Win a trip on a Great Lakes freighter/laker here.

Retro Sixth Boro 2

A few days ago I stumbled into a rabbit hole and enjoyed it down there.  I won’t stay in 2008 for too long, but evolution I found in the ship department intrigued me, change change change. It also made concrete the reality of the scrapyards in  the less-touristed ocean-margins of the globe. Take Orange Star;  she’s scrapped now and another Orange Star delivers our juice.  But what a beauty this juice tanker is,

with lines that would look sweet on a yacht. Laura K has been reassigned to another port.  This  Orange Star was cut up in Alang in October 2010.

Ditto Saudi Tabuk.  She went for scrap in November 2013.  The tug on her bow is Catherine Turecamo, now operating on the Great Lakes as John Marshall.

Sea Venture was scrapped in January 2011.

Hammurabi sold for scrap in spring 2012.   She arrived in Alang as Hummura in the first week of summer 2012.

Some D-class Evergreen vessels have been scrapped, but Ever Diamond is still at work.  Comparing the two classes,  the Ls are 135′ longer and 46′ wider.

Stena Poseidon is now Canadian flagged as the much-drabber Espada Desgagnes, which I spotted on  the St. Lawrence last fall.   Donald C, lightening here, became Mediterranean Sea and is currently laid up.

And let’s end this retrospect with a tug, then Hornbeck’s Brooklyn Service and now just plain Brooklyn.  She’s been around the block a bit, and I’ll put in a link here if you want a circuitous tour. I caught her in Baltimore last spring in her current livery.

All photos by Will Van Dorp, who wonders what the waterscape will look like in 2028, if I’m around to see it.

Review: Tugboats Illustrated

Actually, the full title of this book is Tugboats Illustrated: History-Technology-Seamanship with Drawings by the author Paul Farrell

I first heard of the book and Paul Farrell last February;  I got an email from an editor at W. W. Norton expressing interest in licensing one of my photos for the cover of the forthcoming book. The photo was the 9th in the post called “Helen’s Last Waltz.” I was thrilled, as you might imagine, and we arrived at a price. Then I hoped it would be an attractive, technically accurate book.

A few months later, Norton’s publicity department sent along a five-page sampler and asked if I’d write a review of the book. The cover letter described Tugboats Illustrated as “gorgeously detailed guide to the evolution, design, and role of tugboats” from “ the earliest days of steam up to today’s most advanced ocean-going workboats” and referred to its “dynamic drawings that show how different kinds of propellers move, to explanations of the physics and engineering that allow this movement to happen.”

Mr. Farrell, an architect with almost a half century of experience, was described as having spent a quarter century researching and writing this book, his first. When someone spends that amount of time focusing on a subject, I’m impressed. But I wasn’t ready to do a review until I saw the entire 156-page book, which arrived in November.  The photo below should illustrate how comprehensive this slim but well-designed book is.

I first paged through it and then read it cover to cover. Paging through, I noticed how many of these “dynamic drawings” there are, more than 70 of them at least, depending how you count.  Below is a sample of a set of drawings from p. 114, illustrating an evolution that always mesmerizes me . . . a flanking turn with a long tow on a winding river, and he shows it from both the downstream and upstream perspective.

Indeed, an architect’s drawings honed by years of professional work complemented with captions, guided by the experts in the wheelhouse, illustrate complex maneuvers in this and many other instances.  Ironically, Farrell never intended to showcase his illustrations in the book; he says it began as “rough sketching intended to guide a mythical illustrator who would intuit just the right feel and content” until he realized this these sketches, such as they were, would work. He reports that doing the set of drawings to illustrate hull chines as seen from underwater were pivotal. I find them charming, below (p. 93),  a boon to the book and not just “limited” or “enough.”

Then there are the photographs, over 80 of them in total and more than half of them in color, many of them taken by photographers whose work I know and have great respect for: Brian Gauvin, Alan Haig-Brown, and Pat Folan.  There was one photo by Rod Smith, who has so many to choose from in his albums on the shipbuilding work at Senesco. Many of the black-and-white photos come from the collections of Steven Lang and Brent Dibner. Other photos introduced me to photographers I’d like to see more of in the future.

In the “Acknowledgements,” Farrell reveals that he first sent a draft of the book to Norton in 1996, a full twenty years ago. When a book takes shape over such a long period of time as this one, it gets vetted for accuracy and thoroughness, which this one has.

Got friends who want to learn about tugboats? Want to expand your own knowledge of the history and variety of these vessels? Then order it here.

I’m just so thrilled that my photo from that July 17, 2012 move graces the cover of this fine book that I’ll digress and post three more photos from that day.

Helen, she is a classic from 1900!   Does anyone have photos of her working out of South Carolina waters as Georgetown?  In that photo above, Helen looks just slightly like Little Toot in Hardie Gramatky’s wonderful watercolors, reproduced on p. 11 of Paul Farrell’s book.

Click here for some previous reviews.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

 

 

Really Random Tugs 20

Here’s a range of photos from the present to the unknowable past.  Gage Paul Thornton . . . 1944 equipment working well in adverse 2014 conditions.   Photo by Bjoern Kils of New York Media Boat.

In 2007, McAllister Responder (1967) moved Peking (1911) across the sixth boro for hull inspection.  Photo by Elizabeth Wood.  That’s me standing on port side Peking adjacent to Responder house.

1953 Hobo races in Greenport Harbor in 2007.

A glazed over Gulf Dawn (1966)  inbound from sea passes BlueFin (2010).

Deborah Quinn (1957) awaits in Oyster Bay in 2010.

HP-Otter and HR-Beaver . . .  said to be in C-6 Lock in Fort Edward yesterday.  Photo by tug44 Fred.   New equipment chokes on ancient foe but no doubt will be dried off to run again.  Compare this photo with the fourth one here.

Unidentified tug on Newburgh land’s edge back in 2009.  I’ve been told it’s no longer there.

Unidentified wooden tug possibly succumbing to time in August  2011.

Ditto.  Wish there was a connection with a past here.

Thanks to Bjoern, Elizabeth, and Fred for their photos.  All others by Will Van Dorp.