Update: How Great a Threat to Mariners are Overboard Shipping Containers?

Posted on by March 4, 2018

As if the waters off North Carolina’s Outer Banks aren’t dangerous enough, this morning the US Coast Guard released an announcement that “70 stray cargo containers pose a threat to mariners off North Carolina.”

The Maersk Shanghai lost approximately 70 to 73 cargo containers due to high winds and heavy seas on Saturday. The over 10,000 TEU ship was the largest container ship to ever call on a Florida deep-water port on its first port call to South Florida, this summer.

The problem with shipping containers is that some do not sink, but can float mostly submerged for an extended period of time. They can be a real threat to small or moderate-sized vessels. There is solid evidence that the Irish sail-training ship Asgard II sank after hitting a floating container in 2010. Last year, Thomas Ruyant sailing in the Vendee Globe race, had his boat almost torn in half in a collision with what was believed to be a shipping container.  

Estimates of how many containers go overboard vary widely. Continue reading →

The Cooperage at the Mystic Seaport Museum

Posted on by March 3, 2018

The first time I visited Mystic Seaport Museum, in addition to spending time on the historic ships, I recall spending quite a while talking to the docent in the village cooperage. The production of barrels, for the storage of oil on whalers, as well as for the storage of water and other provisions, is one of the crucial but often overlooked skills and technologies that made whaling, and indeed life at sea possible. Here is a short video about the cooperage at Mystic Seaport. 

Status-6 — Putin’s Autonomous “Doomsday” Torpedo

Posted on by March 2, 2018

In a speech yesterday, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened the United States with a new generation of nuclear weapons. Putin showed video animations of nuclear warheads raining down on Florida from a new design of an intercontinental cruise missile that he described as  “invincible.” Perhaps even more disturbing was the presentation of a “doomsday” torpedo designed to create a 500-meter tsunami that could contaminate a large section of coastline with radiation, making the area unlivable for up to a century.

The new weapon, called Status-6 by the Russians and dubbed Kanyon by the CIA, is described as an unmanned nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed underwater vehicle able to deliver a thermonuclear cobalt bomb of up to 100 megatonnes. It is said to have a top speed of 100 km/h (54 kn), with a range of 10,000 km (5,400 NM.)  Russian Oscar Class submarines are said to be capable of carrying up to four of the torpedoes secured externally.

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How It Went Down: The Sinking of the Polina Star III and Oyster Marine

Posted on by March 1, 2018

Alexander V. Ezhkov, the owner of the ill-fated Polina Star III, has a story to tell about his experience with the yacht builder Oyster Marine. 

Ezhkov has put up a website to detail what took place from when in 2012, he ordered the 90′ Polina Star III, a new Oyster 885. The site details what transpired from her delivery in 2014, to her sinking and capsize in 2015 after her keel fell off while sailing in the Mediterranean off the Spanish coast.

The tale continues with Ezhkov’s attempt to reach a settlement with Oyster, ending in the firm’s surprise liquidation in early February of 2018.  To read the story on his web site, HOW IT WENT DOWN — THE OYSTER STORY, click here.

It is a fascinating and disturbing story. Continue reading →

Secrets of a Frozen Ocean — World Premiere : Across Arctic Ice by Hovercraft

Posted on by March 1, 2018

Next Wednesday, March 7th, at 6PM, Neil and Ariel Weisbrod‘s new documentary, “Secrets of a Frozen Ocean“, will have its world premiere at the New York City International Film Festival at the Producer’s Club 358 W 44th Street, NY, NY 10036.

“Secrets of A Frozen Ocean” follows 75 year old, Yngve Kristoffersen, a Norwegian Scientist who sets out on a dangerous 13 month expedition in a small hovercraft together with Audun Tholfsen. Their destination was the most  remote areas of the Arctic . It is his last chance to fulfill his lifelong dream and prove a theory about an asteroid hitting the Arctic Ocean millions of years ago. Along the way they encounter extreme weather, hungry Polar Bears, and mechanical difficulties. The theory which inspired the expedition was based on data collected by Dr. John K. Hall on the US Ice Station T3 in the late 1960’sThe documentary is a mix of groundbreaking science and wild adventure. Continue reading →

A Terrible Year for the North Atlantic Right Whale

Posted on by February 27, 2018

2017 was a disastrous year for the North Atlantic right whale and 2018 looks no better. In fact, it could be worse. Last year 17 North Atlantic right whales, died which is more than died in the past five years combined. Even worse, during this year’s breeding season, which typically runs from November through February, no newly-born calves have been sighted.

The Boston Globe quotes Barb Zoodsma, a biologist who oversees the right whale recovery program in the Southeast for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “This is the worst-case scenario. This season appears to be a total bomb. You don’t have to be a math major to see that things are going in the wrong direction.”

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$40 Million Dollar Trove from SS Central America Displayed (& Tommy Thompson Is Still In Jail)

Posted on by February 26, 2018

Last weekend, gold ingots and coins valued at $40 million salvaged from the wreck of the SS Central America went on display for the first time at the 2018 Long Beach Coin, Currency, Stamp & Sports Collectible Expo. (The gold is for sale if you have the cash at your disposal.)

SS Central America was a 280-foot paddlewheel steamer operating between New York and Aspinwall during the California Gold Rush. The ship sank in a hurricane off South Carolina in 1857, killing 425 passengers and crew and sending 30,000 pounds of California gold coins, ingots and gold dust to the sea floor. The lost gold was valued at $2 million or roughly $300-400 million in current dollars. News of the loss shook the US financial markets and contributed to the Panic of 1857. 

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Captain Lindsey’s Daughter Dido Elizabeth Belle, Lord Mansfield and British Slavery

Posted on by February 25, 2018

Around 1779, a portrait of two young women was commissioned by William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield. The women were Elizabeth Murray and her cousin Dido Elizabeth Belle. For its day, the painting was controversial, even shocking.

Dido Elizabeth Belle was a dark-skinned mixed-race woman while her cousin was a fair skinned English woman, and yet in the painting, they were represented as having equal status. Both are dressed in fine gowns. Typically in a painting of the period, servants or others of a lesser class would be painting lower in the composition. Belle and Murray are painted as equals, as indeed they were, at least in William Murray’s household.

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Remembering Robert Smalls – Slave, Captain of the Planter, First Black Captain in the US Navy & Congressman

Posted on by February 24, 2018

Here is a story well worth retelling. An updated repost from 2012. The remarkable story of Robert Smalls.

On May 13, 1862, Robert Smalls, a 23-year-old slave, who served as the pilot of the Confederate armed transport, CSS Planter, led eight fellow slaves in an audacious flight to freedom. They seized the CSS Planter, steamed it out past the batteries and forts of Charleston harbor and turned it over to the Union naval blockade.  Smalls would go on to become the first black captain of a U.S. Navy vessel, a South Carolina State Legislator, a Major General in the South Carolina Militia, a five-term U.S. Congressman and a U.S. Collector of Customs.  

Harper’s Weekly of June 14, 1862 recounts the escape:
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The Giant Shipworm Revealed — Not a Worm or an Eater of Ships, but Definitely a Giant

Posted on by February 23, 2018

For years, naturalists have found the shells of giant shipworms, but have not located the giant shipworm itself. Last spring, that changed. Giant shipworms were discovered buried in the mud in a Philippine mangrove swamp. 

Two important facts about the giant shipworm, whose scientific name is Kuphus polythalamia. They are not worms at all, but a variety of bivalve mollusk. Also, they do not eat the wood from ships. They are related to other shipworms, which have indeed been the bane of sailors for all of history, but these giants do not eat wood. 

Continue reading →

Remembering Captain William A. Martin — Black Whaling Ship Captain From Martha’s Vineyard

Posted on by February 22, 2018

Photo: Jeanna Shepard

As Black History Month winds to a close it seems worthwhile to recall Captain William A. Martin, the best remembered black whaling ship captain from Martha’s Vineyard. He is often referred to as the only black whaling captain from the island. Nevertheless, historian Skip Finley suggests that at least five black whaling captains had ties to Martha’s Vineyard. Of the roughly 2,500 masters of American whaling ships under sail, at least 63 were men of color.

William Martin was born in Edgartown in 1830, just one generation away from slavery. Educated in a local school which taught young boys how to read, write and navigate, Martin made his way into the whaling trade because of his skill as a writer. Rather than ship as a seaman, Martin signed on the Edgartown ship Europa as the first mate and ship’s log-keeper in 1853. In 1857, after his voyage on the Europa, he married a Native American woman named Sarah Brown.

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Was Homo Erectus the First Sailor? Did Ancient Sailors Tell Sea Stories?

Posted on by February 21, 2018

The timeline for when humans first took to the seas keeps getting moved back.  A few years ago, stone tools were found on the island of Crete which were dated to 130,000 years ago. Likewise, stone implements on the island of Flores in Indonesia have been dated back to 700,000 to 800,000. Both Crete and Flores could only have been reached by some sort of boat or raft. Likewise, human remains and stone tools found in Spain dating to over a million years ago may indicate that some ancient hominin navigated the hazardous Straits of Gibraltar from Morocco.

Recently, a researcher has offered a new theory, suggesting that Homo erectus, a hominid predecessor to modern Homo sapiens, could have been a sailor and might have been the first to develop language in order to communicate while underway on a boat.   

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The Old Man of the Lake — Crater Lake’s Ancient Wanderer

Posted on by February 20, 2018

A 30′ long stump of what is probably a hemlock tree has been floating vertically, bobbing up and down, in Crater Lake, in south-central Oregon in the western United States, for more than 120 years. How much longer it has been floating, no one knows. Carbon dating suggests that the log is around 450 years old. The floating stump has been given the name the Old Man of the Lake. 

Joseph S. Diller, the first geologist to study crater lake near the turn of the 20th century, described the floating tree stump in a report dated 1896. About 30′ long overall and two feet in diameter at the waterline, the stump floats about four feet above the water.  It is buoyant enough to support a person’s weight. Why has the log floated vertically for so long? No one really knows.

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Ocean-Aged Rum and the Democratic Party Ticket of 1896

Posted on by February 20, 2018

Yesterday, we posted about four barrels of rum from Lunenburg’s Ironworks Distillery which are being carried around the globe by the barque Picton Castle on its seventh circumnavigation.  The sea voyage is expected to nicely age the rum.  Of course, distilled spirits being sent to sea to mellow and age is nothing new. William Bunting reminded me of a passage from his excellent book, Live Yankees, the Sewalls and their Ships  involving rum and politics.

Arthur Sewall, in addition to being a shipbuilder and ship owner, was also a bank president, director of a railroad, and the Democratic Party vice presidential candidate in 1896 on William Jennings Bryan’s first run for president. There is a story about how Arthur managed to acquire the seat on the presidential ticket and it involves ocean-aged rum. From Live Yankees: 

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‘Round the World Rum on the Picton Castle

Posted on by February 18, 2018

When the barque Picton Castle embarks on its seventh circumnavigation this April, it will have a special cargo of four barrels of rum from Lunenburg’s Ironworks Distillery stored in the hold. If all goes well when the ship returns to Lunenburg in May of 2019, she will be carrying the same four barrels, and the rum will be better for it. 

Why carry four barrels, 900 liters, of rum around the world? In the age of sail, wine would often spoil on long voyages. Distilled liquors, however, were often improved by the motion of the ship, as well as changes in atmospheric pressure and temperature. With luck the Ironworks’ ‘Round the World Rum will be nicely aged by the voyage. 

Continue reading →