150 Years Ago Today — The Last Great Tea Race Ends in a Tie

In 1866, five clipper ships set out together from Foochow, China bound for England in what would be the last  Great Tea Race. On September 6th, one hundred and fifty years ago today, after sailing more than 15,000 nautical miles, … Continue reading

Freedom Class LCS in Service — 100% Failure Rate in Last Year

The LCS saga continues. The USS Freedom suffered another serious failure.  There are currently three Freedom Class Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) in service — USS Freedom, USS Fort Worth, and the USS Milwaukee.  In the past twelve months, all three of the … Continue reading

Norsepower & Enercon Sailing on Rotors — Future of Commercial Sail?

Last week, the Finnish marine engineering company, Norsepower Oy Ltd, was awarded €2.6M in funding to further its research and development of the Norsepower Rotor Sail Solution technology. The new models of the technology will include the world’s largest ever Flettner … Continue reading

Windjammer Peking Returning to Hamburg from New York in the Spring

German media is reporting that sometime next spring, the historic Laeisz Flying P-Liner Peking is expected to leave New York harbor, where she has been a museum ship at the South Street Seaport Museum for over 40 years. She will be returning to … Continue reading

Crystal Serenity, RRS Ernest Shackleton & the Northwest Passage — What Could Go Wrong?

The 1,070 passenger 68,870 GT cruise ship Crystal Serenity is arriving in Nome, Alaska on Sunday, August 21st, before continuing on in a 1,500 km voyage to transit the Northwest Passage via Canadian and Greenland. The 32 day voyage, which began … Continue reading

Falls of Clyde Ordered to Leave Honolulu Harbor

Sad, if not surprising news. The Hawaii Department of Transportation Harbors Division (HDOT Harbors) has ordered that the 138-year-old sailing ship Falls of Clyde be removed from Honolulu harbor. Previously, in a letter dated June 15th, the Harbor Division had … Continue reading

Wavertree — Stepping the Final Mast Before Returning to South Street Seaport

Forty six years ago yesterday, the  full-rigged iron sailing ship Wavertree, arrived in South Street Seaport after being towed from Argentina. The 1889 built windjammer had languished as a sand barge in Argentina for decades, before being purchased and partially restored … Continue reading

Repost: The Battle of Stonington, CT 1814 — Rocket’s Red Glare, Bombs Bursting in Air

Two hundred and two years ago this week, in a three day battle, the militia at Stonington, CT drove off a four ship Royal Navy flotilla during the War of 1812.  Here is lightly edited repost about the battle from July … Continue reading