Ship-trip-tease

Okay . . . now for something new.  Recall the question I tossed out with the “Relief Crew 9” about suggestions for a puzzler-post name?  Well, Jed came right up with Tugster Teaser, and I like the ring of that name.  The problem though is that this puzzle relates to a ship, not a tug.  Hence, the title above.

The question:  identify the date the foto above was taken.    The bright shiny clue is the passenger vessel bound for sea in the middle of the foto, the one with the three stacks.  This was her FINAL departure from New York.  With that clue, you super researchers might even figure out the three tugs starboard of the three-stacker.

While your brain goes into involuntary analysis mode, enjoy some random fotos all taken in the past week.  Sea Service (ex-Sea Star) 1975 eastbound headed for KVK.  Sea Star is so less utilitarian-a-name than what it currently responds to.

I put up a slightly later foto from this scene two days ago:  Christine McAllister and Kimberly Turecamo.

Kimberly  Poling (ex-Jaguar) 1994 understated beauty on an October afternoon, splendor nevertheless.

Ooops!  the best ones always get away!  When I pressed the button, the shutter (shooter?) lagged like never before.  You should have seen what was right there!  @#@!

New York Central No. 13 with two piercings (and related implants) looks impatient about getting splashed;  I can hear that hull wondering how maneuvres will feel with two thrusters.

Final shot:  Penobscot Bay (WTGB 107) aligns with Robbins Light, Our Lady of Bedloe’s Island, and some point over on the west shore of Manhattan.  I hope to have an exciting gallivant story from a certain 140′ ice breaking tug very soon.  Not WTGB 107.

All fotos except the puzzler ( or ship-trip-teaser) by Will Van Dorp.   Captain Allen Baker . . . thanks much for the puzzler.  Answer soon.

Finally and related, Steve Turi sent along a link to dramatic ocean liner  postcards.  Besides drama, they radiate romance and mystery, especially the ones with handwriting on the back . . . a range of emotions recorded in ink now public and  immortalized.  Anyone game for some Griffin and Sabine?  Last spring, Steve sent along fotos of toys he’d carved from driftwood.

Also related:  today I enjoyed the “Edge of New York” at the Museum of the City of New York, thanks to a reminder from Old Salt Rick here.  Looking large there, I also found a model of Norman Belgeddes’ 1932!! design for an ocean liner.  See it here.  Wow!!  And now that I think on this a bit, doesn’t it look vaguely like Bowsprite’s avatarship?

Rust Never Sleeps

is the  name of Pamela Talese’s show (til end of October) at Atlantic Gallery at 135 W 29th Street Suite 601 in Manhattan.  Pamela and I share some large interests . . . like her take on Alice Oldendorff and

and mine.

Hers of Penobscot Bay, now

gearing up for ice-breaking duty, and mine.

Charleston, being painted in dry dock and

fotograffed in KVK.

Pamela has worked in cold weather and

and warm to

capture the ubiquitous

changes wrought by rust and paint . . . in paint.  Below, she travels to her “studio” via the paintcycle.

See her website here.  See her work at the Atlantic Gallery soon.

A description of people along the waterfront in the first chapter of Moby Dick omits a class; Melville mentions some  “posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reveries. Some leaning against the spiles; some seated upon the pier-heads; some looking over the bulwarks . . .”   To do the unthinkable of completing Melville, my annotation here:  “still others women as well as men devoted to the arts, brush in hand, gazing in turn at ship and then at canvas . .  or notebook, then searching with paints or inks or charcoal . . . ”  Go Pamela.  Go others!  I love it.    More waterfront art soon.

Boundaries

I rejected calling this “government boats xx” because the vessels belong have more in common than that. Boundary keeping makes up part of their mission. Griffon patrols the border between two countries, maybe on a political ice-breaking mission . . .

Penobscot Bay cruises through Hell Gate between tidal straits aka “rivers,”

these RB-S‘s between Brooklyn and Staten Island,

Penobscot Bay and Line between the especially tense line between Queens and Manhattan, and

440 between “us” and “them.” Moose and manatee in the sixth boro!!

When we confront boundaries of all sorts in life . . . between familiar and unknown, right and wrong, comfortable and not . . . , we sometimes find the support, internal or otherwise, to navigate safely.

Some unrelated catch-up: My answer to the question on distance of pitch and roll at any 100′ level is 35 feet. It’s one week to the marine Olympics in NY. And it’s time to vote in a run-off that ends in only TWO weeks.

All images here by Will Van Dorp.

Big Ones 2

So, the tug with the most horsepower in the boro . . . Penobscot Bay, 140′ icebreaker tug?

Sorry. Only 2500 hp. Pati R Moran?

5100. The almost new Rosemary McAllister?

6000. Atlantic Salvor?

6480. Christian Reinauer?

Getting close with 7200. It has to be Powhatan?

Well at 5.73 megawatts . . . that’s 7684 horses. And the winner is . . .

Turning its back to my lens . . . Lincoln Sea, churning out 5.883 megawatts if my calculations are correct . . . er . . . 8000 horsepower. For more Lincoln Sea, see Fred’s shots here. Truth be told, though, I haven’t seen Lincoln Sea in the boro in a spell.

I hear there’s an 11,000 hp tug arriving in the watery boro soon.

Photos, WVD.

Government Boats 3

Here’s another installment in this series.

 

This blue vessel coming west on the East River enjoys a second life. T/V Kings Pointer, its current name, began life as an ocean surveillance vessel. See particulars with the navy here and the specs here. Example of spec info? Fuel capacity…

 

…almost 230,000 gallons. This vessel, which replaced an earlier Kings Pointer in 1992, distinguished itself in 1999 when it arrived first on the crash scene of EgyptAir Flight 990.  Kings Point, by the way, is the Long Island location of the US Merchant Marine Academy.

 

A year older than Kings Pointer, here’s USCG medium endurance cutter Seneca. Read through this article on some of her accomplishments. See crewman using a gun in a rescue here.

 

Here’s USCG ice breaking tug Penobscot Bay headed for the Verrazano Bridge; I’ve used this shot before, but for a good look at its icebreaker hull, see this link.

 

Based in Bayonne, as is Penobscot Bay, USCG small harbor tug Hawser has a set of siblings with similar names. See here.

 

Finally, here’s Corps of Engineers converted tug Gelberman. For another shot, click here. It’d be interesting to see government boats from other large ports. Any senders?

Photos by Will Van Dorp.