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On this date six years ago I had the good fortune of spending the whole day on Oneida Lake on Ward’s Island, a repurposed Electric Boat-built 1929 ferry but then idled by a bridge between Manhattan and Ward’s Island. The self-propelled ship, once a double ended ferry, was acquired by NYS for the Barge Canal in July 1937 and repurposed as a crane ship in 1939. That fully-rotating 65′ crane had lift capacity of 10 tons.
Here are some photos I took back in 2015, playing with different settings on a camera that was new at the time. Our starting point was just east of lock E-23, technically in Brewerton NY. Temperatures went up to the 70s and there was no wind, a perfect late fall day in central NYS.
The mission was to replace the navigation (summer) buoys with spar (winter) buoys, low-profile, placeholders.
The blue-only photo looks west, and the full color one below looks east and shows the actual red or green color of the winter placeholders.
On the mirror like surface of the lake, there was an illusion of flying over the planet.
The summer buoys were plucked out for refurbishing over the winter. Once a buoy was plucked and raised, Ward’s Island crew detached the anchor chain from the summer buoy, and tied that chain off to a cleat as the crane operator swung the buoy
Like I said earlier, the calm weather on the lake made for a floating-in-space illusion.
Some of the buoys are bolted to artificial concrete islands.
The wheelhouse, along with the whole rest of the boat, spent some time in Lyons dry dock from 2016 until she was reefed in salt water in 2018, where she now lies.
All photos on this date in 2015, WVD.
In six days, the gates along the NYS Canal system will be staffed and lifting/lowering vessels across the state. This is the third in a series of posts about the vessels that have worked to keep the canals functioning.
Not all these vessels, like Wards Island below, remain; it’s now over 50′ under surface of salt water on Hempstead Reef, scuttled. The bow of the tug here, Syracuse, does continue to work as she approaches her 90th birthday.
Below you see the 88-year-old tugboat Syracuse towing a group of canal vessels late in the season back in 2014.
Tender #1, along with most of the other tenders, are now in their 10th decade.
Ditto #9.
Curvaceous boats are out, and state-of-the-art boxy ones are in.
Boats like Waterford approach their eighth decade.
Grand Erie and Urger, both inactive, have been featured here many times.
And boxy, mostly nameless replacements have replaced them.
Urger here exits the lower side of Lock 17 in Little Falls as the sun illuminates the chamber.
All photos, WVD, who salutes the crews who operate these boats, even the finicky old ones. If you’re sailing the canal this summer and see these boats and crews, give a wave but also give them wide berth, as they diligently work to keep the waterway open.
Of course, if you need a guide, check out my virtual tours based on my boat transits and my one bike trip.
Click here for a series of posts and photos of Wards Island from a point almost exactly four years ago, in mid November when I spent a long day photographing the old crane ship on what was to be her last year working. Today she lies at the bottom of Hempstead Reef, a few nautical miles of the west end of Jones Beach Island, in 50 to 70 feet of water. A map follows below. I’d love to hear from anyone who has fished or dived on the reef during the past year, since she has graced the bottom with her hospitable presence.
Although I’ve posted some of these photos, the day I spent on her pulling Erie Canal navaids out of Oneida Lake was a magical day . . mid November, but warm and without wind. Enjoy this set.
Photos were taken from morning to night on November 16 and then the last one is November 17, 2015. All are re-edited.
She ran, if not quite like a deer.
Heading eastbound into the Lake had the look of space flight.
For a crane ship fashioned from a double-ended ferry, she plucked buoys from the water quite efficiently,
replacing them with ice buoys, of the right color of course.
But for November,
it was an enviable day for photos.
Some of the navaids in the Lake rest on concrete-capped shoals, islands.
At the end of the day, all buoys were transferred to a barge so that Wards Island had cleared decks for the next day of work.
Click on the DEC map below to get to an interactive map.
Click on the photo below to see more of the Flickr photo stream from which it was taken.
All photos not otherwise attributed taken in November 2015 by Will Van Dorp, who is eager to see photos of her taken in her watery home.
And as a wise friend, frequent commenter here has said in relation to another vessel, “[New boats] have come along to supplant and surpass their predecessors. We should count ourselves fortunate to have known so many of the elegant and durable old-timers while they were still around, and feel privileged to help transmit their images and stories into the future.” Thanks, Lee
Wendy Marble took these photos today when her crew was preparing to cast off lines on the Erie Canal.
This is looking forward from wheelhouse of tug Syracuse towing DB6 west from Mays Point, NY.
Then another friend jogged my memory about the date, Nov 16. The rest of these photos I took on Nov 16, 2015. It was shirtsleeve weather, tug Syracuse was busy, and so was . . . .
craneship Wards Island. Yes, the one that’s currently almost 100′ down north of Long Island; you can see it here (scroll) and no, it’s not a 115′ barge.
The above shot I got on Nov 17, 2015, but all the rest here are from Nov 16.
Syracuse speeds the crane out into Oneida Lake,
and the crane goes fishing, or buoying, replacing summer buoys with winter spars.
At the end of the day, temperatures dropped along with the sun, and the buoys were craned over to a work barge, where the buoys would be refurbished over the winter.
Syracuse is quite the unique tug.
Thanks to Wendy and Dave for jogging my memory. Thanks to Wendy for sharing the photos from Mays Point.
Hats off to Glenn Raymo for figuring out where to be to catch this tow at first light.
I know it’s fruitless to wonder whether any archive has photos of any previous trip Ward’s Island made on the Hudson. The only other trip it’s made may have been northbound in the late 1930s.
Hats off to the crews who can do this safely. With the rounded bottom propped up by welded on support beams,
she looks like an animal once living.
Dimensions of the hull are 115’6″ x 38′ x 14′.
It’s a job and it’s a melancholy sight too., knowing the next stop on this express route is the bottom of the ocean off Fire Island.
Many thanks to Glenn for catching this. Previous “canal reef express” posts can be found here.
What is that? asked one gentleman standing at beside a lock. The geese took no chances and scurried as it approached.
From this angle, its ferry origins are quite evident. Scroll to compare with SS Columbia and SS Astoria.
This is the bow of Ward’s Island; she’s departing the way she arrived around 1937 but stern first, leaving under duress.
Here the tow departs E-12 for Amsterdam.
That’s E-11 in the distance, and from this vantage point, I see
the hull as a sounding board for an as-yet invented instrument. I believe that before she goes to the reef, her crane and wheelhouse will be once again mounted. For show.
From one of her former crew, here’s what a working Ward’s Island looked like late in a season, replacing summer buoys with winter buoys.
The next batch I took near E-10, a lock allowing photos from the sunny side.
As you can see, she was certainly rotund.
To close out this post, . . . to that gentleman who couldn’t identify the blue rotund hulk, I’d say this reefing plan is obliterating some NYS history that could be repurposed. Eradicating context destroys a dimension of the Canal. What do you think?
For more about the photo below by Jon Crispin, click here.
The photo above by Jon Crispin. All others by Will Van Dorp.
It occurs to me that someone might want to start a website using the slogan above.
Click here for previous canal reef express posts. For Urger posts responding to and with the same urgency, click here.
Just when I thought I had no more photos for another installment of “seats,” uh . . more appear. This arrangement of seating in this Erie Canal tug has to win a prize. I can’t tell which lock it is, nor (I believe) can Bob Graham, who sent it in. The captain on the Feeney at one point was Bob’s grandfather.
Is that a folding chair way high up on Augie?
Might folding chairs be more common than one might expect?
Ceres has become inactive after a noble attempt to sail north Country produce down to the NYC markets.
Angels Share is the largest Wally yacht I’ve ever seen, the photo taken in North Cove in September 2013.
But the person on the helm got no seat, unless–you suppose?–they’ve got a folding chair in the lazaretto. It’s since been soldand renamed.
NYC-DEP Hunts Point has a variety of seating options.
And let’s end with two European boats: Tenax and
Abeille Bourbon. Tenax has appeared on tugster in 2012 here, and Bourbon . . . here.
Many thanks to Xtian, Vlad, and Bob for sending along these photos. Here are the two previous “seats” posts.
And a final shot below, that was tugster in 2011 at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum in Belle Isle at the helm of the detached house of SS William Clay Ford. Note the “old man’s” chair in the background.
Here’s the series that this follows, a series that shows how busy this craneship still is at certain times of the year. Of course, this could also be called what do you do with an obsolete New York City ferry, a vessel delivered by Electric Boat on October 14, 1929 and replaced by a bridge in fewer than 10 years.
Yes, this is the bow of the craneship, and until I spent a day on board last fall, I assumed the bow wheel was non-functioning if even present.
Excuse the rain spot.
Closeups of bow and
stern.
Here’s a shot from the deck of Wards Island from the incredible warm late November day last year when we pulled a day’s worth of buoys from Oneida Lake, and at the
end of the day, getting a glimpse of the builders plate in the engine compartment.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
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