Tomorrow is the IMO “Day of the Seafarer.” Around here we think that every day should be the day of the seafarer. Seafarers and the ships that they sail are the connective tissue that keeps our world turning. Seafarers UK , has produced a video that asks the question – “What would the world be like if ships and those who sailed them simply vanished?”
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The Vale Brasil is the world’s largest dry bulk carrier with a deadweight of over 400,000 tons. The Singapore flag ship is currently on her maiden voyage with a cargo of 391,000 tons of iron ore. This is enough iron ore to make about 261,000 tonnes of steel, or almost three and a half times the amount used to build San Francisco’s Golden Gate bridge. The original port of call for the ship was changed in the last several days from the Chinese port of Dalian to an Italian port. Early speculation was that dredging hadn’t been completed to allow the ship to dock or that China would not accept ships over 300,000 dwt. Vale SA, the ship’s owner denies that this is the case and says that redirecting the ship in mid-voyage was strictly a commercial decision.
Vale diverts China ore ship for commercial reasons
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The Detroit Riversdays Festival starts this evening and runs through Sunday. In addition to lots of music, food and riverside activities, the sister schooners, 85′ Appledore IV, and the 65′ Appledore V will be available for tours. Sounds like fun.
The MV Wisdom is a small 26-year-old container ship. She has had 14 name changes in her life and no one knows how many owners. The current owner may be unknown as well. She was being towed from Colombo to the scrap-yard in Alang, India when the tug lost control and the MV Wisdom ended up off the beach in Bandra, in suburban Mumbai. She very nearly drifted into the Bandra-Worli Sea Link, a major bridge, but seems to have missed it, as much by luck, as anything else. No one can explain why the tow was so close to shore in the first place. The course was reportedly inshore of several oil rigs. Indian police have detained 15 crew members of the tug, Minerva, for negligence.
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I love sitting and just watching the harbor; watching the boats go by and the turn of the tide. But who has the time these days? For those too busy and/or not geographically convenient, here is about four hours of New York harbor just off the Battery in 42 seconds from John Huntington’s blog. Thanks to bowsprite for passing the clip along
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Time Lapse of New York Harbor www.controlgeek.net from John Huntington on Vimeo.
An impressive fleet of schooners and brigantines will be featured in the the Channel Islands Harbor Tall Ships Festival, this Friday through Sunday at Channel Islands Harbor in Oxnard, California. The visiting vessels include the topsail schooner Californian, topsail schooner Amazing Grace, schooner Curlew, topsail schooner Bill of Rights, topsail schooner The Spirit of Dana Point, brigantine Irving Johnson, and the schooner Patricia Belle.
Tall Ships Return to Channel Islands Harbor
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The first you notice about the Maritime Museum of San Diego are the ships. When I visited last week, the 1863 windjammer Star of India was hove to with two staysails and her spanker set and drawing, and with her main topsail backed, tied up on the seawall right alongside North Harbor Drive in downtown San Diego. Directly off the Star of India‘s stern is the HMS Surprise, the replica of the a 24 gun British frigate the HMS Rose. The Surprise is tied up alongside the steam ferry Berkeley. Down the dock the masts of the replica Revenue Cutter Californian are visible rising above the ferry. Taking a closer look, there are also two submarines, a steam yacht and a pilot boat in the collection. Overall, a very impressive collection of ships and boats, all well maintained and cared-for.
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Photo:Tribun Batam/Zabur Anjasfianto
Just in case you think you had a bad Monday, yesterday the USC container ship Al Rawdah ran aground on a reef in the waters of Pulau Sambu Stone Chain, Rear Padang, Batam, not long after leaving Port Klang, Selangor, Malaysia. The ship was bound for China.
Apparently something called “wreck racing” is a new sport. The website Formula H2O – Underwater Scooter Racing explains it as follows:
The Wreck Racing League or WRL is the sanctioning body for scuba divers racing using underwater scooters or diver propulsion vehicles on natural wrecks of ships sunk to create artificial reefs.
A video demonstrating the “sport”:
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The University of Hawaii research vessel, Ka’imikai-o-Kanaloa, set sail earlier this month to studying the impact of radiation releases in the waters off Japan’s crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
Scientists on UH research ship study impact of radiation releases
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Yesterday we posted about the arrival of seven vaka, Polynesian voyaging canoes, in Hilo, Hawaii. This seems an appropriate time to remember Herb Kawainui Kāne, an Hawaiian artist, historian and one of the founders of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, who died last March at the age of 82. Kāne was also one of the designers of the Hōkūleʻa, a double-hulled voyaging canoe, built by the the Polynesian Voyaging Society. In 1976, the Hōkūleʻa sailed from Hawaii to Tahiti using only Polynesian navigation techniques without modern navigational instruments.
This month, Honolulu Magazine looked back on the life of Herb Kawainui Kāne, who they had only interviewed months before. They called Kāne “one of the principal figures of the Hawaiian Renaissance, that resurgence of Hawaiian culture that began in the 1970s and culminated in the rebirth of hula, the Hawaiian language, traditional Hawaiian music, Hawaiian voyaging canoes, and a growing sense of Hawaiian social and political identity.”
New York City's Fireboat 343
In a lawsuit a whistleblower is charging that New York City’s new $27 million Fireboat 343, named after the number of New York firefighters killed on 9/11, was damaged in a storm last winter when sideswiped by another fireboat, the Firefighter II, which apparently had lost control in the rough currents. The lawsuit filed by Frederick Domini – a city firefighter and licensed marine engineer – alleges that the Firefighter II had been taken out against the advice of the vessel’s pilot.
FDNY’s $27M fireboat, the 343, damaged in collision with sister ship: whisteblower’s lawsuit
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Seven vaka, Polynesian voyaging canoes, arrived in Hilo, Hawaii on Thursday. The project is called “Te Mana o Te Moana” meaning “The Spirit of the Sea.” Starting in New Zealand, the seven vaka have sailed north across the Pacific, by way of the Marquesas and Tahiti. The vaka are drawn from various islands including Faafaite from Tahiti, Te Matau a Maui from Aotearoa, Marumaru Atua from the Cook Islands, Uto Ni Yalo from Fiji and Gaualofa from Samoa. After their stop in Hawaii, they plan to sail east to the West coast of the United States before ultimately returning across the Pacific.
Fleet of seven canoes arrive in Hawaii
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Thanks to Linda Collison for passing the article along.
This will be busy weekend around the Hudson River and New York harbor. At Croton Point Park, on the east bank of the Hudson River, just north of New York City, the Clearwater’s Great Hudson River Revival – a Music and Environmental Festival will be held on Saturday and Sunday, June 18th and 19th. The festival will be a virtual riverside Woodstock, featuring, by my count, over fifty different artists and bands, including Pete Seeger, Martin Sexton, the Indigo Girls, Arlo Guthrie, Josh Ritter, Suzanne Vega, Dar Williams, David Bromberg, Peter Yarrow, John Sebastian, Janis Ian, Lucy Kaplansky, John Gorka, Eliza Gilkyson, The Klezmatics, Tom Chapin and many many more. In addition to music there will be losts of activities, exhibits and sales on the Hudson River sloop, Clearwater.
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Who in their right mind would name a boat Titanic II in the first place? Fortunately there was no loss of life. Prophetically enough, there is already a movie, Titanic II. It sank at the box office over a year before the cabin cruiser.
Photo: Ainhoa Sanchez
Our slightly belated congratulations to Brad Van Liew, the American sailor who won the Velux 5 Oceans single-handed around the world race in his Le Pingouin ECO 60. Van Liew dominated the Velux 5 Oceans race, winning all five legs. Van Liew is the first American to finish three single-handled around the word races. He is also the first person worldwide to sweep all legs of the Velux 5 Oceans race for two complete events.
A very nicely done video showing the inspiring work being done the Jubilee Sailing Trust. The Jubilee Sailing Trust is a registered charity that owns and operates the tallships Lord Nelson and Tenacious, the only two tall ships in the world designed and built to enable people of all physical abilities to sail side-by-side as equals.
Jubilee Sailing Trust – Tall Ship Sailing Adventures for All
Schooners Stephen Taber and Lewis R. French race on Penobscot Bay. photo: Benjamin Mendlowitz
Both the schooners Lewis R. French and the Stephen Taber were built in 1871. To celebrate their 140th birthdays, these grand old ladies will be racing from Camden to Rockland this Friday June 17 in an “1871 Schooner Showdown.”
A race of two historic schooners set for June 17
Visitors can watch up close from the deck of the schooner Olad, which will serve as race committee boat.
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Liz Fry is the sort of person who makes the rest of us feel inadequate. She is from Westport, Connecticut, is 52 and reportedly suffers from asthma. Nevertheless, yesterday she swam the thirty five miles from Battery Park in Manhattan to Sandy Hook, N.J and back. The water was 65 degrees. It appears the she broke the record for the swim on both legs of the trip and also became the first person to swim it both ways in one day. Wow. Our heartiest congratulations. As noted in the Daily New of Open Water Swimming: Liz Fry – the dynamo from Connecticut – is now one of the women in the pantheon of New York City greats.
The last time that a commercial cargo was unloaded from a sailing vessels at the New York docks was 1939. That is, at least, until yesterday, when the 70′ schooner Black Seal arrived in Red Hook, Brooklyn and began unloading a cargo of 20 tons of cocoa beans for Brooklyn’s Mast Brothers Chocolate. See Will Van Dorp’s tugster blog for great photos of unloading the bagged cocoa. See also A Captain’s Lament: Cocoa Cargo on Rough Seas.