Sixth Boro Traffic 4

Traffic, when you’re trapped in it, is not fun.  Watching commercial marine traffic, for me, never gets old, as you might know.  The more things get, the more interesting the harbor seems.    A handful of sophisticated and expensive machinery and its skilled operators jam pack this image.  I see three Centerline boats, JRT, and Safmarine Nomazwe.

Roughly the same place and hour and some later, Thunder, just off the port side of Caroline M, shares this image with at least three other tugboats that almost blend into the cold humid morning.

Foreshortening makes Laura K and Doris Moran seem a lot closer together than they are. 

Here it’s Marilyn George, Coursen, Alex McAllister, and Wye River, I believe.

Besides the three tugs along the left side, that’s Alex, Kristy Ann with RTC 80, Barney, and Kristin Poling pushing Eva Leigh Cutler.  Between Barney and Kristin are at least two Kirby boats.

This was several minutes after the previous photo with some of the same boats.

Daisy Mae here pushes a CMT barge with a Vane unit in the distance, in front of an impossibly packed set of cliffs.

This is not so much packed as it is filled with very different examples of marine commercial traffic.

And in closing, clustered in front of USNS Red Cloud, clockwise starting from Cajun, it’s J. Arnold Witte, USACE Haward, and Marjorie B. McAllister.

All photos, any errors or omissions, WVD, who hits the road again tomorrow.  Peace on Earth!

 

Pairs in Fall

I’ve seen lots of pairs in winter, some in spring, but never until now in fall, at least not acknowledged until this post.

Two sets of pairs appear below, one Centerline and another Moran, the latter escorting in CSCL South China Sea.

Ellen and Patrice here are going to different jobs.

Mary Turecamo and James D Moran here work on the CSCL box ship.

Lots are boats here;  clockwise from the farthest, Haggerty Girls (I think), James D, Margaret, Marjorie B, and James William.

Around 0900, a brace of migratory birds headed north . . .  F-18s maybe.

B. Franklin got an assist from Matthew Tibbetts.

Two old ferries ply their trade:  Barberi with the highest flagpoles and Marchi.

Two top of the line sixth boro McAllister tugs joins forces.

Two old style boats:  Manhattan II and Wanderer, the latter from the Sippican River.

And finally, this juxtaposition passed and allows a comparison of the lines of the 2015 6000 hp Kirby Moran with the 2008 5100 hp Laura K.

All photos in the past week, WVD.

Photos of Thunder

I’ve seen lots of Lightning around the boro of late . . .

and so of course I’ve been counting  . . .

and yesterday I suspected this might be it, a photo of Thunder. 

As we made our way past the Global terminal,

we got confirmation. 

Indeed . . . Thunder can be photographed, here with bunker barge Jackson Eades.

All photos, WVD, who doesn’t profess to be a storm chaser like John Huntington.

ICW Tugs May 2017* A

I’ve traveled the ICW from Charleston SC to NYC, some parts several times.  This is a “revisit”  focusing solely on tugboats. I’ll start in Charleston with Elizabeth Turecamo in the fog.

Recycling comments on the boats below from Georgetown SC, by George Schneider:  “The little one shows the name Laura , which has one of two possible origins: A 45-foot tug by the Equitable Equipment Company of Louisiana, or a 45-foot Army dredge tender of Army Design 320, mirroring the Equitable design. I’m guessing she’s ON 1060493, originally the Army ST 2051, then the Army Corps Fort  Brooke , and now owned by Sampit Towing of Charleston SC.”

And by William Lafferty: “I’m thinking the larger tug is Susan Richards, built in 1909 by the Fore River Shipbuilding Corporation at Quincy, Massachusetts, as the Gen. R. H. Jackson for the Army Quartermaster Corps and stationed at Jacksonville, Florida, later named Fort Sumter and Three Bros. It’s owned by Richards Marine Towing at McClennanville, South Carolina, and has been a fixture at Charleston for decades, originally run by White Stack Towing there.”

Thx George and William.

Crossing the border north to North Carolina, my next stop is Southport, where Sea Oak was working on a dredge project.

And after that, it’s Wilmington and Cape Henry.

The next batch is from Morehead City NC.  Atlantic Dawn was working on a dredging project there.

Na Hoku was there also, formerly a K-Sea boat. She currently works out of Jacksonville.

Liz Alma was too.  

Morehead City is the deep water export center for potash, mined farther north in Aurora.  Grace Moran then waited at the dock.  Is she still around?

Beaufort Belle, then PSC Phosphate, is now Norfolk tug.  Has she been repainted?

Peter G. Turecamo appears still to be working in Morehead City.

Clearly marked here in Norfolk are Miss Willa, Nancy McAllister, and McAllister Sisters.  Second from the left might be Steven Eileen McAllister.

Jack T. Moran was just a year old back ion 2017.

Thunder is one of a trio of Robbins Maritime small tugs with meteorological names:  Thunder, Lightning, and Storm.

Camie  is also a Robbins Maritime boat.

Anne Jarrett is another Norfolk Tug vessel.  It resembles a Vane tug, and at least two former Vane boats are now with Norfolk Tugs:  ex-Patapsco and Sassafras.

All photos, WVD.  The * denotes that most but not all photos were taken in May 2017.  It’s high time I take another trip along the ICW to see what has changed.  And we still have more from Norfolk to the sixth boro.

 

First Hours 2016 b

As was true yesterday, all photos today were taken in the first 12 hours of 2016.  For Chatham, the last tug I saw in 2015, the year end/start distinction was likely irrelevant.  No doubt the same holiday treats were out in the galley in the wee hours of 2016 as were a few hours before in 2015.

From a different angle as last night, here are Michael J,

Camie,

and the “weather tugs.”  I’m happy the precipitation of December 31 has ceased.

Although some people movers waited in reserve, 

another was cross-crissing the Elizabeth.  By the way, is this the same James C. Echols?  Is it still LNG powered?  Does anyone know where the new ferries are being built and delivery dates?

 

The quick side ramp system impressed me.  It was in fact similar to a system on “water bus” I saw near Rotterdam a while back.

Surrie heads back to base, passing BB-64 USS Wisconsin. 

Recognize this vessel, which spent a little time in the sixth boro a bit over a year ago?

It’s HMS Justice, slinging Bryant Sea now in the curvaceous Elizabeth River and

passing Mahan, Stout, and

Oscar Austin, far right.

Closing out today . .  what can you do with $12 million and a 1962 North Sea trawler?  Check here for this story on explorer yacht Discovery.  Here’s another story with much better photos.   Docked astern of Discovery is Shearwater, which was doing a project in the sixth boro back in sumer 2013.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Last Hours 2015

One of my (formerly) secret heroes is Guy Noir, secret because I may be revealing too much about myself in admitting that.  But life’s too short to care about drivel like that.   Noir has an office on the 20th floor of the Acme Building in a “city that knows how to keep its secrets,”  yet each week a different mysterious woman seems to find him in quest of a favor. So imagine this as a view from Noir’s Portsmouth VA office around 1600 hrs .  . . on the last night of the year.  It’s rainy but warm and all the creeks feeding into the estuary course in, with color and warmth of some old coffee  . . .  I was last here, though on the river then, about six weeks ago here.  And notice the hammerhead crane to the right.  Here’s

the deal.  But I’ll come back to this history stuff later.

For now, this is a record of the last night of the year, what my parents used to call “old years night.”

In the fading light, there’s Michael J. McAllister, another McA (Nancy??) behind it, Camie, and a trio of Robbins Maritime minis called Thunder, Lightning, and Squall.  AND if you look carefully beyond the McAllister tugs, you’ll see Dann Ocean’s Neptune and the Colonna Shipyard, where a Staten Island ferry is being overhauled. Click here for previous posts referring to Colonna.

In the driving rain as the last hours of the year ebb away, Vane tug Chatham heads south;  the oil must move . . . . even when the postal stream sleeps.

Shadows . . . on a rainy night paint the river.   And under the “tent” inside

And so ended 2015 for me . . . not a low-flying aircraft but a high flying window perch.

All photos by Will Van Dorp, private and public eye.