The minesweeper USS Guardian ran aground early this morning on a reef in the Philippines’ Tubbataha National Marine Park. The park is a World Heritage Site in the Sulu Sea, 640 kilometers (400 miles) southeast of Manila. USS Guardian is an … Continue reading
Category Archives: Current
New Scientist TV has a fascinating video of what it refers to as a “disco clam.” Oddly they don’t provide the scientific name for the clam. My guess is that it isn’t “disco.” Video captures disco clams producing strobe light show The disco … Continue reading
When I first visited New York’s South Street Seaport in the early 70s, it was a fairly lonely place. There was no shopping mall on Pier 17 and the high-end chain-stores like Guess, Abecrombe and Fitch and Brookstone had not yet been … Continue reading
The Norwegian shipyard Fjellstrand and Siemens are developing the world’s first electrically powered car ferry. Starting in 2015, the 80-meter ferry will will operate across the Sognefjord between the towns of Lavik and Oppedal. The ferry will have the capacity … Continue reading
Workers from New York’s Central Park Conservancy were removing rust from a cannon originally from the British 28 gun frigate HMS Hussar, which sank in New York’s East River in 1780. After removing a concrete plug from the mouth of the cannon, … Continue reading
If the reporting is accurate, this doesn’t seem like the argument that Carnival should be making. Passengers ‘blamed’ for Concordia damages Costa Cruises parent company Carnival is said to have blamed passengers, at least in part, for the damages they … Continue reading
Something things just don’t go as planned. The tug, Christos 22, was towing the decommissioned former German Naval training ship, MV Emsstrom, from Germany to Turkey. On Sunday night, the tug slowed to check a problem with the tow off Hope’s Nose near Torbay, … Continue reading
A recent article in the Alaska Dispatch celebrated the recent population rebound of bowhead whales off Alaska’s North Slope. The bowheads had been hunted to near extinction. A whale count in 1978 estimated that only 1,200 bowhead whales remained in the region. … Continue reading
On the island of Giglio in Italy’s Tyrrhenian Sea, relatives of the 32 passengers and crew who died when the Costa Concordia crashed into rocks last year gathered today to mark the one-year anniversary of the tragedy. One year ago today, the cruise ship Costa Concordia … Continue reading
Last summer, 29 year old Matthew Clark almost won the latest Bailiwick Bass Club Open Challenge in Guernsey. The almost 14 pound fish that he presented at the weigh in should have the won the the £800 first prize if one of the judges … Continue reading
At around 5:00 AM local time, the officer on watch of the nuclear submarine, USS Jacksonville, cruising in the Persian Gulf heard a noise and felt the submarine shudder. When he went to look out the periscope to see what had happened, he noticed that the … Continue reading
The New York Times, this morning, features in their “Room for Debate” section, a worthwhile discussion on the real threats to the survival of whale species, entitled, Did We Save the Whales? In the discussion, Junichi Sato of Greenpeace Japan notes … Continue reading
The captain of the Seastreak Wall Street ferry which hit the Pier 11 in New York yesterday morning, injuring more than 70 passengers, told investigators that the ferry suffered a mechanical failure. Captain Jason Reimer said that the engines would not … Continue reading
They are the subject of myth and legend, the giant squid who battle massive sperms whales and leave battle scars on the whales’ flesh. Now for the first time in history, a living giant squid has been recorded in its … Continue reading
This morning around 8:45 local time, a Seastreak catamaran ferry carrying approximately 300 commuters slammed into a loading barge at Pier 11 in New York City’s East River, in Lower Manhattan, injuring at least 50 passengers. At least one was reported to be in … Continue reading
The Shell drilling rig, Kulluck, which broke its towline and was blown aground off Alaska’s Sitkalidak Island on New Year’s Eve, is reported to have been refloated and made ready for a thirty mile tow to the sheltered waters of Kodiak Island’s … Continue reading
At the age of 79, Newfoundland master wooden boat builder Henry Vokey decided to build one last schooner. He finished her and she was launched this summer, a few months after his 82nd birthday. CBC’s Land & Sea has produced … Continue reading
The plan was to move Shell’s two drilling rigs from Alaska to Seattle Washington for maintenance and repair. Shell’s tax bill, however, may have also played a role in the timing of the move. Things have definitely not gone according to plan. … Continue reading
The rudder for the composite clipper ship, City of Adelaide, arrived in Australia the week before Christmas Typically, when a ship comes into port, the rudder arrives last. Very little has been typical, however, about the struggle to save the oldest composite clipper ship, the City … Continue reading
Last May, we posted about Giovanni Soldini and the Maserati Sailing Team’s attempt to break the monohull sailing record from the Ambrose Lighthouse in New York to Lizard Point off the south west coast of England. That attempt was stymied … Continue reading