USCGC Polar Star Heading to Rescue Ice-bound Ships

Posted on by January 5, 2014

Polar_Star_2The USCGC Polar Star is on its way to attempt to break free two ice-bound ship off Antarctica.   So far, three icebreakers have attempted to free the the MV Akademik Shokalskiy, which has been stuck in Antarctic ice south of Tasmania since Christmas Eve.  The Chinese ice breaker,  Xue Long or Snow Dragon, has now become stuck in the ice as well, after successfully evacuating the passengers from the cruise ship by helicopter to the Australian icebreaker,  Aurora Australis.  The Polar Star sailed from Sydney on Saturday and is expected to arrive at the stricken ships, which are roughly 1,500 miles south of Hobart, around January 12th.

Will the Polar Star succeed where the other icebreakers failed?   If she succeeds, it will come down to one word – horsepower.   Continue reading →

A Speck in the Sea — the Deadly Business of Commercial Fishing

Posted on by January 5, 2014
Fishing_Deaths

Click on the graphic for a larger image.

The New York Times has a wonderful account of the rescue of John Aldridge, a commercial fisherman who fell off a lobsterboat in the middle of the night last July, over forty miles off Montauk, Long Island, NY. Aldridge spent 12 hours in the water using his boots flotation.  The article by Paul Tough is well worth reading. It is available on-line : A Speck in the Sea.

Mario Vittone, of gCaptain, gives his take on the article in: Trying Very Hard To Die: The Preventable Disease in Commercial Fishing.  As might be inferred by the title, the tone is acerbic, but Vittone does make good points. Too many commercial fisherman die needlessly in a working culture that has traditionally lacked a due focus on safety.

Commercial fishing is dangerous. As noted by the Center for Public Integrity: Commercial fishing is the deadliest vocation in the United States.Four years running, from 2007 to 2010, the Bureau of Labor Statistics ranked commercial fishing as the most dangerous occupation in the United States. From 2000 to 2010, the industry’s death rate was 31 times greater than the national workplace average. 

According to the CDC of 545 commercial fishermen who died while fishing in the U.S.:

  • More than half of all fatalities (279, 51%) occurred after a vessel disaster
  • Another 170 (31%) fatalities occurred when a fisherman fell overboard
  • Another 56 (10%) fatalities resulted from an injury onboard
  • The remaining 40 (7%) fatalities occurred while diving or from onshore injuries

Thanks to Rebekah Harris for contributing to the post.

A Sad Pilgrimage to the New York Boat Show

Posted on by January 4, 2014

boatshowEvery year I go to the New York Boat Show. In recent years, it has been a sad pilgrimage. Where once a wide range of boat types were represented, for the past decade or so most of the boats on the floor have been cookie cutter power boats. This year there were literally no sail boats in the show at all, with the exception of a couple of nice day-sailers and kayaks at the Hobie booth and a Sunfish at the Dory Shop.

Sadder still was the paucity of marine vendors. Many of the usual suspects were missing. West Marine and Defender Industries apparently didn’t think it worth showing up. A bad economy, poor priced show space or the growth of on-line shopping. Whatever the reason, I could find essentially nothing that I wanted to buy, which was a first.

Aurora Australis Standing By As Snow Dragon May Now Be Stuck in Ice

Posted on by January 3, 2014

The Australian icebreaker Aurora Australis, currently carrying passengers rescued from a stricken Antarctic expedition cruise ship, has been told to stand by to assist the Chinese icebreaker, Snow Dragon, as necessary. The icebreaker Xue Long, or Snow Dragon, notified rescue authorities that its crew was concerned about “their ability to move through heavy ice in the area”, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said on Friday afternoon.

Second Antarctic rescue Aurora Australis on standby to free icebreaker

The Defecating Dog as Compass

Posted on by January 3, 2014

north-defecateI am surprised that the Vikings didn’t discover this first.  The Vikings did, after all, develop a sun compass for use on sunny days and used sunstones to find the direction of the sun when it was overcast.  One might have though that they would have perfected the defecating dog compass, as well.

Recently, researchers have documented that when dogs defecate they usually align their bodies along the magnetic north-south axis, not unlike the needle of a magnetic compass.

Dogs align themselves with Earth’s magnetic field when it comes time to poop

Continue reading →

Passengers Airlifted from Icebound MV Akademik Shokalskiy

Posted on by January 2, 2014

All 52 passengers have been airlifted from the MV Akademik Shokalskiy by a helicopter from the Chinese Icebreaker Xue Long or Snow Dragon.  The passengers were ferried to the Australian ice breaker Aurora Australis.  Both icebreakers had attempted, but failed, to break through the ice, which has trapped the expedition cruise ship off Antarctica south of Tasmania since Christmas Eve.  The 22 Russian crew members will stay aboard the the MV Akademik Shokalskiy to await a shifting in the ice to allow the ship to depart for open water.  The ship has been restocked with provisions by the Chinese helicopter which ferried out the passengers.

Chinese arrival at the Shokalskiy

Giant Yellow Duck Explodes in Taiwan

Posted on by May 27, 2014

Disturbing video of the Giant Yellow Duck exploding shortly before a New Year’s Day celebration in the northern Taiwan port city of Keeling. it is unclear what caused the duck to explode though some are speculating that it was attacked by eagles. The duck has had a difficult tine in its visit to Taiwan. While it attracted 4 million visitors in its month stay in Kaohsiung, it needed to be deflated and taken ashore when Typhoon Usagi hit the island.

We have followed the travels of Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman‘s inflatable sculpture “Spreading Joy Around the World,” better known simply as the Giant Yellow Duck. In June, we posted about its visit to Hong Kong, and in September its arrival in Pittsburgh.  The almost 60 foot tall inflatable sculpture inspired by a bath toy has traveled to 13 cities in nine countries on its journey around the world. Thanks to Kevin Boatman Foster for pointing out the recent explosion on Facebook.

Giant yellow rubber duck explodes

Happy New Year — New Moons & Super Moons!

Posted on by January 1, 2014

new-moonHappy New Year! The New Year 2014 begins with both a new moon and a supermoon. The month also ends with a both a new moon and and a supermoon on the 30th. A supermoon is the term applied when the moon is at perigee, the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit. A supermoon during a full moon will cause the moon to appear up to 16% bigger than usual. A supermoon during a new moon will, of course, not appear larger, as the moon is in the shadow of the earth during a new moon and is not visible at all. Tides are usually higher during a supermoon.

According to Earth Sky: “..The year 2014 will have five supermoons: two January new moons, and the full moons of July, August and September. The full moon on August 10, 2014, is the closest supermoon of the year (356,896 kilometers or 221,765 miles).

Continue reading →

Cape Wind Beats the Deadline — Signs Deal for Offshore Wind Turbines

Posted on by December 31, 2013

WindmillsIn the list of the world’s 25 largest operating offshore wind farms, 11 are based off the United Kingdom. Denmark has five; China three; Belgium and the Netherlands each have two, while Germany and Sweden each have one.  Don’t look for the United States in the list, because the US has no offshore wind farms, despite having one of the longest and windiest coast lines in the world.

With luck, that may begin to change before too long.  Cape Wind, a project to build an offshore wind farm offshore wind farm on Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound off Cape Cod, Massachusetts, recently signed a deal with Siemens for 130 3.6-megawatt wind turbines. Siemens is also reported to be likely to take $100 million equity stake in the project.

As important as the deal itself, was the date that the contract was signed.  If Cape Wind had failed to show that they had made a substantial start on the project by December 31, 2013, they would have lost a U.S. investment tax credit that would cover 30 percent of its estimated $2.6 billion in construction costs.

Siemens Puts Weight Behind US Offshore Wind

MV Akademik Shokalskiy Still Stuck — Third Icebreaker, Aurora Australis, Turns Back

Posted on by December 30, 2013
Aurora Australis berthed in Hobart. French icebreaker L'Astrolabe at right.

Aurora Australis berthed in Hobart. French icebreaker L’Astrolabe at right.

We posted recently about the Chinese icebreaker,  Xue Long, or Snow Dragon, which came within about 6 miles of the expedition cruise ship, MV Akademik Shokalskiy, before being forced to turn back. MV Akademik Shokalskiy has been trapped in pack ice off Antarctica south of Tasmania since before Christmas.  Now, the third icebreaker to attempt to assist the stricken ship, Aurora Australis, was stopped by ice and poor weather roughly 10 nautical miles away.  News.com.au reports: “30-knot winds and driving snow has forced the rescue icebreaker to turn back.

Continue reading →

Another Container Ship Cracking – MSC Monterey Anchored off Newfoundland

Posted on by December 30, 2013

Container_ship_MSC_MontereyMSC Monterey, a 4,892 TEU container ship, was bound from the Belgium port of Antwerp to Newark, NJ, but diverted to Newfoundland after cracks in her hull were discovered. The ship is now at anchor south of Newfoundland, near Trepassey Harbour. Four passengers were airlifted off the ship. The crew of 20 remains aboard.  MSC Monterey was built in 2007 in Daewoo Mangalia Heavy Industries in Mangalia, Romania.

In June, the 2008 built, 8,110 TEU container ship, MOL Comfort, broke in two about 200 nautical miles off the coast of Yemen.   The aft section sank of the ship on June 27th while the bow section stayed afloat until July 11th.  The MOL Comfort’s five sister ships were also found to have bottom plate buckling deformation, suggesting that they were experiencing excessive hull loading.   A few weeks ago the Committee on Large Container Ship Safety of the Maritime Bureau of Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism issued an interim report on the casualty.  Interestingly, in the structural modeling of the hulls the ships, the engineers were not able to replicate the conditions that would have caused the MOL Comfort to break in half.  The report found that the calculated loading was only 67% of the allowable design stress of the ship.

Sharks – Photobombing and Posting on Twitter

Posted on by December 30, 2013

shark30n-2-webTwo recent items on sharks in the news — a photobombing shark off the coast of California and Australian sharks posting warnings on Twitter.

Off Manhattan Beach, California, June Emerson took a photograph of her son and a friend playing in the surf but didn’t realize until they were on their way home that there appears to be a large shark behind them and to the right.  She posted the photo on Facebook and Instagram where it quickly went viral –spreading across the internet and being picked up by national newspapers and television news programs.   Local station KTLA reports that sightings of great white sharks are not uncommon near Manhattan Beach.

On the other side of the world, Australian sharks are using Twitter to warn swimmers of their presence.   Specifically, GrindTV reports, that “scientists have fitted 320 sharks, many of them great whites, with transmitters that automatically issue warnings to the Surf Life Saving Western Australia’s Twitter feed when the tagged sharks approach within a kilometer of the coast’s popular beaches. 

Continue reading →

Global Ship Traffic — Then and Now

Posted on by December 28, 2013

11530100184_4f6201f997_oBy definition, shipping is the ultimate offshore industry. For most, the business of shipping is largely invisible, literally beyond the horizon. I recently came across two representations of global shipping – a plot developed from ship’s logs from the 18th and 19th centuries and an animation of a week’s shipping traffic using AIS and satellite technology from FleetMon. It is interesting to see how much and how little has changed over the centuries.

Continue reading →

Icebreaker Snow Dragon Now Stuck in Ice, Six Miles from MV Akademik Shokalskiy

Posted on by December 28, 2013

xuelongThe Chinese icebreaker Xue Long, or Snow Dragon, has gotten to within around 6-7 miles of the expedition cruise ship,  MV Akademik Shokalskiy, before it too was stopped by thick ice off the coast of Antarctica, south of Tasmania. Three icebreakers were dispatched to rescue the stricken cruise ship. Unfortunately, the Chinese Snow Dragon is the largest and most powerful of the three and it is stuck in the ice.

Continue reading →

Icebreaker Snow Dragon on Horizon with Penguins!

Posted on by December 27, 2013

A few hours ago, Professor Chris Turney, on the  MV Akademik Shokalskiy currently trapped in pack ice off Antarctica, south of Tasmania, tweeted:  Great news. Icebreaker Snow Dragon on horizon with penguins! Everyone very happy!   

We suspect that the penguins are not actually part of the rescue.  Professor Turney also tweeted a light-hearted Vine video.  Click on the upper left corner of the video for sound.

https://vine.co/v/h9r9IwB1wJM

The Akademik Shokalskiy is one of eight Finnish-built Akademik Shuleykin-class ice-strengthened oceanographic research ships built for the USSR. Five of the class have been converted to expedition cruise ships.

Stuck in Antarctic Ice – Snow Dragon Underway to Rescue MV Akademik Shokalskiy

Posted on by December 26, 2013
MV Akademik Shokalskiy

MV Akademik Shokalskiy

Expedition cruising is often considered “adventure travel” as it involves smaller ships and often more exotic destinations.  The scientists and passengers on the current cruise on the ice-strengthened expedition cruise ship, MV Akademik Shokalskiy, appear to be having more of an adventure than they had bargained for. The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) received a distress call on Christmas morning, indicating that the ship was stuck in Antarctic ice around 1,500 nautical miles south of Hobart in Tasmania.  Three ice breakers are on their way to break the ship free.  The The 166m-long Chinese icebreaker, Xue Long, which translates as Snow Dragon, is expected to arrive on Friday.

The ship, with 48 passengers and 20 crew members aboard, left New Zealand on Dec. 8, intending to follow in the footsteps of the great Antarctic explorer and scientist Douglas Mawson.  Apparently roughly half the passengers are scientists and half are tourists.  The ship had been following the course of the of Mawson’s  Australasian Antarctic Expedition (AAE) of 1911, when it became stuck in the ice.

Doug Webb, Slocum Gliders and the GliderPaloosa

Posted on by September 21, 2018

Did you catch GliderPaloosa 2013? No? Neither did I. It was easy to miss as it was almost entirely underwater.   GliderPaloosa 2013 was an event held in September and October, sponsored by NOAA in cooperation with Dalhousie University, the University of Maine, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, and the Northeast Fisheries Science Center, which launched between 12 to 16 autonomous underwater robotic vehicles, also known as Slocum gliders, from Nova Scotia to Georgia.  These gliders were deployed through the peak fall Atlantic storm season to collect data on ocean conditions, which will help improve scientists’ understanding of hurricanes and pave the way for future improvements in hurricane intensity forecasts.  See also our recent post: Underwater Gliders Gather Data to Help Predict Hurricanes

These gliders, named after Joshua Slocum, the first person to sail single handed around the world, use buoyancy and gravity to glide up and down through the oceans, powered only by tiny pumps which move small amounts of water around to adjust the glider’s buoyancy.  The gliders were conceived by Douglas C. Webb with the support of Henry Stommel and others. They are capable of extended independent underwater travel and data collection, surfacing periodically to transmit data to shore by satellite. Here is Doug Webb talking about Slocum gliders.

Doug Webb on the Slocum Glider

The Miniature Ship Red, White, and Blue

Posted on by December 22, 2013

2004-D03-120On July 9, 1866, Captains Hudson and Fitch with their dog, Fanny, sailed from New York in  a three masted full-rigged 26 foot long boat named “Red, White, and Blue.” They arrived in Margate in in East Kent, UK on August 16th.  While the rigging was conventional, if diminutive,  “Red, White, and Blue’s” hull was a galvanized metal lifeboat. The trip was intended to publicize a new metal lifeboat design by New York boat builder, O.K. Ingersoll.  The words “Ingersoll’s Improved Metallic Life Boat” were written on both sides of the hull.

The problem with the marketing plan was that when the square-rigged lifeboat arrived in England, no one believed that two men and a dog had sailed the small craft across the Atlantic in slightly more than a month.  Unfortunately, the two captains had no way to prove that they had indeed sailed “Red, White, and Blue” across the ocean and were never taken seriously. Years later, scholars reviewed the logs, the weather and sightings, and concluded that the two captains and their dog did indeed complete their voyage as claimed.  Even if Captains Hudson and Fitch and Fanny were never given credit in their day for their remarkable voyage, the “Red, White, and Blue” was captured for posterity in a Currier and Ives print now in the collection at Springfield Museums.  Thanks to Harry Milkman for passing the story along.

THE MINIATURE SHIP “RED, WHITE, AND BLUE.”