Congratulations to the Capt. Shane Granger, Meggi Macoun, Joanne Har and all the good folks on the historic vessel Vega for being honored with the Asia Pacific Laureate Foundation annual award for Social Services in recognition of “Humanitarian Services to Isolated Island … Continue reading
Rick Spilman
Two news stories recently on drugs aboard cruise ships suggest two very different types of drug problems. U.S. Customs and Border Protection raided the MSC Poesia, on Jan. 4, prior to the ship departing on a “Jam Cruise” a floating music festival featuring … Continue reading
What is it about model ships made of LEGOs? The little plastic blocks are such an unlikely raw material for model shipbuilding. Here is a lovely 1:50 scale reproduction of the Cutty Sark created by Henrik Hoexbroe. Click the photo for a larger … Continue reading
Maritime Reporter points out the connection between the US Merchant Maritime Academy and this weekend’s tragic shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and nineteen others at a supermarket in northwest Tucson, Arizona, which left six dead and Representative Giffords in critical condition with a gunshot wound to the … Continue reading
This Thursday, January 13th, the three ships of the Cunard fleet – the Queen Mary II, the Queen Elizabeth and the recently delivered Queen Victoria – will rendezvous in New York harbor near the Statue of Liberty around 6:45 PM. A fireworks display will help to celebrate the “Cunard … Continue reading
A disturbing report published yesterday in the Telegraph. HMS Victory rotting and being pulled apart under its own weight HMS Victory is riddled with rot and being pulled apart by its own weight, maintenance reports of the historic ship have … Continue reading
Two hundred years ago today the USS Revenge, under the command of Oliver Hazard Perry, sank in the waters off Rhode Island. On Friday, divers, Charles Buffum, Mike Fournier and Craig Harger, announced that they believe that they have located the wreck. In … Continue reading
Update: While originally reported that two crew members were knocked overboard during “a lifeboat training exercise,” it is now being reported that the sailors were performing lifeboat maintenance. The commenter (below) reports that both men were wearing safety harnesses which … Continue reading
Here is reminder of what the Southern Ocean can be like even in the Summer months. About a month ago the MS Veendam made a cruise from the Falklands to Patagonia and ran into a storm. Waves of over 30 … Continue reading
This week Carnival Cruise Lines was awarded $24 million in a lawsuit with Rolls Royce related to the repeated failure of the “Mermaid Pods” on Carnival’s Cunard Line ship, Queen Mary 2. Last year about this time Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines reached a $65 million settlement … Continue reading
A Ukrainian sailor, on a Dutch ship in international waters steaming toward Houston, Texas, got into a fight with a fellow crew member New Year’s Eve and the next morning was found dead in his cabin. An autopsy is being performed to determine the … Continue reading
The USS Kittiwake, a 1945-vintage submarine rescue ship, was scuttled this week off Grand Cayman’s Seven Mile Beach in the Caribbean to become a destination for reef fish and sport divers. The ship settled onto the bottom on an even keel … Continue reading
The cruise industry continues to change. While Boston reported a record number of cruise passengers traveling through its cruise terminal in 2010, the city of Philadelphia is planning on turning its cruise terminal into an an Urban Outfitters retail store, having only two cruise ships scheduled to call … Continue reading
Despite the implication that nobody in the Navy brass has a sense of humor, there are lots of of fun videos floating around the ‘net made on US Navy ships that suggest otherwise. My personal favorites all tend to be lip-sincing … Continue reading
There is no bad time to read Melville. For the past 15 years in early January, the New Bedford Whaling Museum has a held a Moby Dick Marathon, an event which includes a non-stop reading of the great American novel. … Continue reading
On the night of December 7,1942 ten British commandos set off in five wood and canvas canoes from a British submarine in the Bay of Biscay off the coast of occupied France. Their intent was to paddle 75 miles up the Gironde estuary and attack … Continue reading
Rather than pressuring the Japanese to stop whaling, the vigilante violence of the Sea Shepherds made it more difficult for Japanese diplomats to compromise in negotiations to reduce whaling according to documents released by WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks releases documents about anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd … Continue reading
This video, which was tweeted about by Sailing Magazine, stunned me. I had never seen an International Moth class boat and had frankly never imagined a hydrofoil boat of this size zipping about like some sort of otherworldly water creature. … Continue reading
The “Support Captain Owen Honors – USS Enterprise” Facebook page has over 11,000 supporters. Admiral John C. Harvey is not one of them. This afternoon, Admiral Harvey relieved Captain Honors of his command. Enterprise captain out; former Ike skipper … Continue reading
As Shakespeare noted, “the course of true love never did run smooth.” That was literally the case when, in early October, Tokelaun teenager Filo Filo, with two of his friends, set off to visit a young lady on the neighboring Fakaofo atoll, some sixty miles … Continue reading