SeaWorld tragedy — a reminder of why orcas should swim free?

Posted on by April 18, 2010

SeaWorld tragedy — a reminder of why orcas should swim free?

For wildlife conservationists, the tragic death of SeaWorld trainer Dawn Brancheau is a sobering reminder of why creatures as large and majestic as killer whales simply should not live in captivity.

The World Society for the Protection of Animals and the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society are just two of the organizations that have campaigned against the practice. First, they say, killer whales in captivity often get sick and live on average only into their 20s (though there are exceptions). In the wild, the females typically live into their 50s or beyond and the males at least into their 30s.
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Orca Tilikum Kills Trainer at Sea World

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Tilikum

Orcas, commonly known as killer whales, have never been known to kill a human in the wild.  The same is not true of orcas in captivity. Today Tilikum, a 12,300 pound bull orca,  the largest whale in captivity, attacked and drowned a female trainer at Sea World’s Shamu Stadium in Orlando, FL.   This is not the first trainer death associated with Tilikum. He was also involved with two other orcas in 1992 in the death of a trainer at Sealand of the Pacific near Victoria, British Columbia.   Tilikum was at the scene of a death of park visitor on July 6, 1999.  Tilikum is not the only captive killer whale to have attacked a trainer.  In December of last year, a trainer was also drowned after being held underwater by a killer whale in a Spanish zoo.   Since the 1970s more than ten cases of trainers attacked by orcas have been recorded.

Killer Whale Kills SeaWorld Trainer In Front Of Shocked Audience

Update: Plastiki Almost Ready to Sail

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Last March we posted Plastiki – Boat made of plastic bottles to make ocean voyage about  a project in which David de Rothschild intended to build and sail a catamaran made of  around 12,000 recycled soda bottles across the Pacific.   Almost a year later Plastiki is getting ready to sail.

Trash floats eco-warrior’s boat

David de Rothschild is talking trash, lots and lots of trash.

“There were 25 billion Styrofoam cups used last year. How do you even get your head around what 25 billion Styrofoam cups looks like?” he said. “Eighty-odd percent of what’s purchased by Americans is thrown out within six months.”
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Maritime Museum Round-up – Models, Spooks, Anchors and a New Museum

Posted on by April 18, 2010

USS Constitution Model Shipwright Guild’s Annual Model Ship Show – Models in the Spotlight – Running through March 20th. Admission to the Museum and the exhibit are free; donations are welcome. A total of 75 different ships created by modelers from across New England will be on display.

Haunted night at Hull Maritime Museum –  Hull’s Maritime Museum will hold its first ever haunted night. The ghoulish event will take place in the dark hours of Saturday, May 15. It comes after several staff members experienced spooky happenings in the 140-year-old building.
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BBC update on the Clipper City of Adelaide and the Battle of the Ballads

Posted on by April 18, 2010

BC apparently has posted an interesting videocast on the composite clipper City of Adelaide.  I write apparently because it is available only in Britain and being on the other side of the pond I can only take the word of my British friends.   The BBC does have an interesting blog post nevertheless.  Thanks to David Hayes for passing the link along.

Is bringing a tall ship back to the Wear too much of a tall order?

In more of less related news a battle of the ballads has broken out between UK singer/songwriters and an Australian singer songwriter. All are attempting to pen and sing music to save the ship though the Brits want her to be returned to the River Ware where she was built, while the Australian would like her returned to her namesake city.

Ballad battle to save historic City of Adelaide ship

Historic riverboat, Becky Thatcher, sinks in Ohio River

Posted on by April 18, 2010

The historic riverboat, Becky Thatcher, a 220-foot, 74-year-old stern-wheeler sank in the Ohio River off Neville Island near Pittburgh, apparently due to the weight of a record snowfall which also collapsed the top two decks.

Historic riverboat sinks in Ohio River
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Poisoned Shipments: Are Strange, Illicit Sinkings Making the Mediterranean Toxic?

Posted on by April 18, 2010

A very disturbing article in this months Scientific American suggesting that criminal groups have been scuttling ships containing chemical and pharmaceutical waste, effectively using the Mediterranean as a toxic dump site. Thanks to Steve Phelps for pointing it out.

Poisoned Shipments: Are Strange, Illicit Sinkings Making the Mediterranean Toxic?
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Fleet Grows for Green Bay’s Tall Ship Festival

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Pride of Baltimore II

There are twelve tall ships scheduled to participate in Green Bay, Wisconsin’s  Tall Ship festival this August, though at this point, only six names have been announced. These are the HMS Bounty, the schooners Roseway, Amistad, the Pride of Baltimore II, the Unicorn and the S/V Denis Sullivan.

Fleet Grows for Green Bay’s Tall Ship Festival

UPDATE: Captain Reports that Microburst Sank SV Concordia

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Cross-sectional drawing of a Microburst

Captain William Curry of the SV Concordia is reporting that the school ship was struck by a microburst, also referred to a white squall, which knocked down the 188′ three masted schooner,  rolling the ship 90 degrees. She sank in twenty minutes.  Microbursts are capable of generating wind speeds higher than 75 m/s (168 mph; 270 km/h).  All aboard made it to the lifeboats and were rescued.

We’ve made it! British teenagers survive 40-hour ordeal after ship is sunk by towering waves

The captain also reported that the ship capsized on Wednesday rather than Thursday as had been previously reported.

The schooner Pride of Baltimore in 1986 and the school ship Albatross in 1961 are both believed to have been capsized by microbursts or “white squalls.”  Microbursts also cause “wind shear” which has been blamed for the crashes of several commercial air liners.

Fear the Blobfish

Posted on by April 18, 2010

The Blobfish

An intriguing if slightly disturbing article and photo from the LA Times:

Fear the blobfish

As scary as the jumping Asian carp may be, there’s something even scarier  –  the blobfish.

As you can see from the accompanying photograph, the cunning blobfish (Psychrolutes marcidus) is the most terrifying fish in the world.  And if you’re not afraid of it yet, you should be, because there’s always something lurking out there that can get you.
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Cutty Sark to be Restored by Olympics; Fate of City of Adelaide Delayed

Posted on by April 18, 2010

The Cutty Sark will be restored and ready for new visitors in time for the 2012 Olympics.   The ship was nearly destroyed by fire in 2007.    The other, albeit just barely, surviving composite clipper ship, the City of Adelaide, which has been threatened with destruction, has received a two month delay to allow additional time for her to be moved.

Cutty Sark to be restored in time for 2012 Olympics

Delay on Adelaide clipper’s fate
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“Class Afloat” School Ship Concordia Sinks Off Brazil

Posted on by April 18, 2010

The West Island College “Class Afloat” school ship Concordia, en route between Recife, Brazil and Montevideo, Uruguay,  is reported to have sunk last night off the coast of Brazil.   All 64 passengers and crew were reported safe after being  rescued by the Brazilian Navy and Air Force.

Canadians rescued after ship sinks off Brazil

All 64 passengers and crew of a Canadian sailing ship that sank in high winds have been rescued from life rafts off the coast of Brazil.A distress signal was picked up from the three-masted SV Concordia around 1700 (1900 GMT) on Thursday.   A Brazilian Air Force plane spotted the rafts from the Concordia floating about 300 miles off the coast of Rio de Janeiro three hours later.  The passengers and crew were plucked from the sea early on Friday.
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Fair-well to the Otto Hahn

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Nuclear power as a propulsion system for merchant ships was the future that never arrived.  The Otto Hahn was the second of only four nuclear powered commercial cargo ships ever built.   The first was the NS Savannah, which operated between 1962 and 1972 and is now laid up in Baltimore, MD.  The Otto Hahn was recently scrapped after a long and varied carrier, most of which as a non-nuclear ship.

The Otto Hahn’s  keel was laid in 1963 by Kieler Howaldswerke A.G. and she entered service in 1968 when her reactor was commissioned.   The ship was named in honor of Otto Hahn, the German chemist and Nobel prizewinner, who was credited with the discovery of nuclear fission of uranium in 1938.   She carried ore for ten years until she was laid up in 1979.
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USS Kittiwake – From Ghost Fleet To Artificial Reef

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Old Navy ship set to depart Va. ‘Ghost Fleet’

The federal Maritime Administration is scheduled to tow another ship from Virginia’s so-called “Ghost Fleet.”   A former Navy submarine rescue ship called Kittiwake is set to become the 85th ship to be towed from the James River Reserve Fleet off of Fort Eustis.   The 1945-vintage ship is scheduled to be towed Thursday to Dominion Marine in Norfolk, where it will be cleaned before it is sunk as an artificial reef in the Cayman Islands.   That is scheduled to occur on July 4th.

Containerships – from Slow to Fast to Slow to Fast to Slow Again

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Containership operations has always been like riding a roller coaster, with many highs and lows and unexpected twists and turns.  One sign of this is the fluctuating speeds of container ships over the years, going  from slow to fast to slow to fast to and now to slow, once again.

Slow Trip Across Sea Aids Profit and Environment

Many consider the Ideal X, a converted T2 tanker owned by Malcom McLean, which carried 58 containers in 1956, to be the first containership.  The Ideal X had a top speed of around 15 knots.   In 1972, McLean had built eight of the largest containerships in the world at the time, the magnificent SL-7s.  They could carry 1,000 containers at 33 knots.  They were indeed the clipper ships of the containership age and they steamed straight into the oil crisis of 1973, where oil prices tripled and continued to rise.  The SL-7s were ultimately sold to the US Navy for conversion to Fast Sealift Ships.
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French Warship Sales to Russia Worries Allies

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Does politics make for strange shipmates?

NATO allies worry about France’s decision to sell big warships to Russia

CHAMPAGNE and other French products may soon face declining sales in Tallinn, Tbilisi and places in between. The possible sale by France to Russia of up to four Mistral-class assault ships, at up to $750m each, is stoking fear and mistrust. The deal, agreed on “in principle” by France, could be formalised during a visit to Paris next month by Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev. The ships would enter service in 2015.
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Sea Shepherd Farce Continues – Illegal Boarding and Foam Baby Crocodiles

Posted on by April 18, 2010

The Sea Shepherd farce continues.  The ex-captain of the Ady Gil cut through anti-boarding nets to board a Japanese whaler and was immediately arrested.   In related news, Sea Shepherd crew onboard the Steve Irwin, a vessel named for the television host of the show “Crocodile Hunter,”  are now throwing fake crocodile eggs at the Japanese whalers.

Paul Bethune, the captain of the speed boat Ady Gil who managed to get the boat run down by a Japanese whaler, jumped aboard the Japanese whaling ship Shonan Maru 2 from a jet ski on Monday, “with the stated goal of making a citizen’s arrest of the ship’s captain and presenting him with a $3 million bill for the destruction of a protest ship last month.  As reported by the Associated Press,  Bethune was immediately arrested himself.
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On Crete, New Evidence of Very Ancient Mariners

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Here is an intriguing article suggesting that we humans have been taking to the sea for far longer than had been previously recorded. Recently stone tools have been found on the island of Crete which date back at least 130,000 years and may be much older.   As Crete has been an island for  more than five million years, this suggests that those who carried the tools to the island were very ancient mariners indeed.  Thanks to John for passing the article along.

On Crete, New Evidence of Very Ancient Mariners
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Photos Recovered from Digital Camera Dropped Overboard on Queen Mary

Posted on by April 18, 2010

Strange but true.  Digital memory cards are indeed an amazing technology.

Couple’s precious holiday snaps recovered intact from the bottom of the Atlantic… 16 months after digital camera was dropped overboard from QM2

When Dennis and Barbara Gregory accidentally dropped their digital camera over the side of the Queen Mary 2 cruise ship in the middle of the Atlantic, they thought their holiday snaps were gone for ever.  But 16 months later the couple have been reunited with the pictures after a Spanish fisherman found the camera in his nets.   Amazingly, trawlerman Benito Estevez discovered there were five images still intact on the Nikon’s memory card.