Seventy-five years today, the Royal Navy sank the German battleship Bismark in a three-day running battle in which the Bismark sunk the British battle cruiser HMS Hood. Ultimately, the German battleship was disabled when her rudder was damaged in a … Continue reading
Rick Spilman
Yesterday thousands lined the shores of the Hudson to watch the Fleet Week Parade of Ships. Unfortunately, this year, I couldn’t be there. Here, courtesy of the US Navy, is a unique view of the festivities from the flight deck … Continue reading
May 24th was not only the 75th anniversary of the tragic sinking of HMS Hood. It was also Bermuda Day. On this, the morning after Bermuda Day, it seems worthwhile to think of the Dark and Stormy nights spent on … Continue reading
On May 24, 1941, the battlecruiser HMS Hood exploded after being struck by several shells from the German battleship Bismark during the Battle of Denmark Strait. The Hood sank within three minutes with the loss of 1,415 sailors, all but three of her crew; … Continue reading
Starting Wednesday this week, the fleet will be in town, well part of it anyway, to celebrate the 28th observance of Fleet Week New York. Eight Navy warships, two Coast Guard cutters, and a Marine expeditionary unit will converge on the harbor. … Continue reading
When I first came to New York in the last quarter of the last century, I went to work for Moore-McCormack Lines, which had a terminal in Brooklyn on the Gowanus Canal. For better or worse, the Brooklyn waterfront has … Continue reading
The website for the Republic of Null Island reads: “Welcome to Null Island! The Republic of Null Island is one of the smallest and least-visited nations on Earth. Situated where the Prime Meridian crosses the Equator, Null Island sits 1600 … Continue reading
Mystic Seaport’s Henry B. duPont Preservation Shipyard is working in partnership with Plimoth Plantation to restore Mayflower II. Mayflower II will move back to its berth at the Plimouth Plantation for the summer and then return to Mystic for an extended … Continue reading
In December, we posted about a new breed of ocean racing sailboats with foiling daggerboards, which look somewhat like Salvador Dali’s moustache. Safron Sailing Team recently posted a video to explain how these foils work. From an engineering and design point of view, … Continue reading
Last week we made a post with the headline, HMS Victory ‘Collapsing’ Under Her Own Weight. The headline was alarmist at best. (We borrowed it from the BBC, but that is no excuse.) The historic ship will, of course, not be … Continue reading
Robert John Hopkins was one of the lesser-known heroes on the Titanic. He died in 1943 at the age of 77 and was buried in an unmarked grave in the Holy Name Cemetery, in Jersey City, NJ. Last Saturday, his descendants gathered … Continue reading
Next week is a great week for oysters if you are in the Northeast. Next Thursday is the Billion Oyster Party in Brooklyn, NY, while on Friday, the Newport Oyster Festival will be kicked off with an Opening Night Party at … Continue reading
The finishers in the 2016 Transat bakerly single-handed trans-Atlantic race are now arriving in Brooklyn. This year’s winner, Francois Gabart on the 100′ trimaran MACIF, crossed the finish line on Wednesday, in the near record time of 8 days, 8 hours, 54-minutes and 39-seconds. The Transat … Continue reading
On May 4th, the 1441 DWT Panamanian registered product tanker Tamaya 1 drifted ashore on a remote beach in Liberia near Robertsport, with no crew aboard. There appears to have been a fire in the ship’s deckhouse and one of two lifeboats … Continue reading
Sailors have long considered Friday to be an unlucky day and Friday the 13th, particularly so. On this Friday the 13th, it seems appropriate to remember the unlikely tale of HMS Friday. Sometime in the 1800s, it is said that … Continue reading
This week the BBC reported: Lord Nelson’s HMS Victory ‘collapsing’ under own weight. Sadly, this is not a new story. Five years ago we posted about an extremely similar account in the Telegraph: HMS Victory rotting and being pulled apart under … Continue reading
The crew aboard the schooner A.J. Meerwald had just finished a Saturday evening sail on the Delaware River near Trenton, NJ when they heard screams at around 7PM. They immediately launched a boat and headed in the direction of the screams … Continue reading
HMS Illustrious, the UK’s only working aircraft carrier and the last surviving ship from the Falklands War is to be scrapped. The 689 ft-long 22,000-tonne Invincible-class aircraft carrier traveled close to one million sea miles in her 32-year career with the Royal … Continue reading
Sailing is all about technology and has been ever since the first sailor spread a stretched an animal skin as a sail. The America’s Cup, however, is far more technological than most sailing by a large measure. This thought occurred … Continue reading
I am a huge fan of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. The contest is a whimsical literary competition that challenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels. If you are not acquainted with Edward Bulwer-Lytton, he … Continue reading