A year and a half ago we posted about SeaBubbles — foiling electric water taxis. The idea to develop a five-person water taxi comes from Alain Thébault, the designer and skipper of record-breaking ocean-going hydrofoil Hydroptère. The distance from an idea to implementation, … Continue reading
Rick Spilman
We recently posted about crewing opportunities for the auxiliary-sail trading vessel Tiare Taporo operating from the Cook Islands. The Tiare Taporo is, however, not the only commercial sailing vessel serving the Cook islands. The SV Kwai will soon be departing on its 45th voyage from Hawaii calling … Continue reading
Sometime in the 1990s, two different species of lionfish made it into the waters of the Atlantic off Florida. Native to the Indo-Pacific, the venomous, predatory fish spread rapidly, decimating local reef fish in the Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, and the … Continue reading
Most of us think of Alexander Graham Bell as the inventor of the telephone, as indeed he was. He was also an early pioneer in hydrofoil boats. His hydrofoil, Hydrodome #4, better known as the HD-4, set a world marine speed record … Continue reading
We recently posted about concerns that the current Maine lobster boom may collapse in time due to climate change. The fishing industries in Maine and Alaska are facing a far more immediate challenge, however. New US tariffs on steel and aluminum and … Continue reading
A new study from the journal Nature makes a terrifying observation — the rate at which Antarctic ice is melting has tripled from only a decade ago. This is significant as more than 60 percent of the freshwater on Earth is … Continue reading
Last year we posted about warships from World War II that had vanished after illegal scrappers literally cut them up and hauled the steel away. Here is a news item on theft on a different scale and with a better outcome. … Continue reading
For several years, we have been following the attempts to raise Arctic explorer Roald Amundsen‘s research ship Maud from where it has been sitting in ice and mud for close to 90 years. To say that the conditions in Cambridge Bay off the Nunavut … Continue reading
A group of “urban explorers” ventured out to climb aboard an abandoned Soviet submarine tied up in the Maritime Quarter, the former NDSM shipyard in Amsterdam North, in the Netherlands. The submarine was built in 1956 or 1957. It was designated … Continue reading
Today, the New York Times featured an article titled — “Climate Change Brought a Lobster Boom. Now It Could Cause a Bust.” The article suggests that while rising water temperatures due to climate change have brought a boom in the … Continue reading
A ferry across Lake Toba in North Sumatra sank on Monday in bad weather and a reported 192 are missing and feared dead. Only 18 survivors have been rescued. Rescuers looking for additional survivors have been hampered by high winds … Continue reading
On June 25th, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will be investigating an unidentified shipwreck 40 miles off the coast of Hatteras Island using a robotic submersible launched from the research vessel Okeanos Explorer. The exploration will be livestreamed with viewing … Continue reading
I recently saw two stories in the press that happen to overlap. Captain Reinhard Hardegen The first story was the report of the death of Reinhard Hardegen at 105 years old. Hardegen was believed to have been the last surviving German U-boat commander from … Continue reading
Three years ago, the BBC published an article with the clickbait title of “Why is the US still using a Nazi tall ship?” The article was about the USCG Cutter Eagle and was OK as far as it went. The title … Continue reading
A quirky video for a Saturday. The mantis shrimp is an intriguing, colorful and frankly, rather frightening creature. Fortunately, most types grow no more than about 4″ long, although the zebra mantis shrimp found from East Africa to the Galápagos … Continue reading