A great interview with Brad Van Liew, the winner of the first leg of the Velux 5 Oceans singlehanded around the world race.
In 1940 and 1941, Moore McCormack Lines took delivery of four Rio class C3 Class passenger/cargo liners from Sun Shipbuilding. They were the Rio Hudson, the Rio Parana, the Rio de la Plata and the Rio de Janeiro. In May of 1942, they were all requisitioned by the US government and converted to small aircraft carriers known as “baby flat-tops.” Three were given to the Royal Navy and one was retained by the US Navy. The Rio Parana, renamed HMS Biter, had a difficult service life, being hit by a torpedo from one of her own aircraft and then later being damaged by fire while in port. The Rio de Janeiro, however had the most tragic history. Renamed HMS Dasher, she sank after an explosion during aircraft refueling on March 27, 1943, with a loss of 379 out of 528 crewmen. At the time, the cause of the explosion was covered up. Now author and historian John Steele and his wife Noreen have written a book, The American Connection to the Sinking of HMS Dasher, examining the causes of the tragic sinking.
After 67 years, the truth of HMS Dasher tragedy is revealed
Continue reading
Paul Watson and his merry band of bumbling pirates, the Sea Shepherds, stars of the “reality” TV show, Whale Wars, have a new high speed toy boat and have recruited Michelle Rodriguez, the actor who played the kick-ass helicopter pilot in the hit movie, Avatar, to join them at some point, her schedule permitting, on a voyage in the Southern Ocean. Nothing like a flashy boat and Hollywood tough-girl glamor when violating international law on “reality TV.”
Continue reading
Photo: MICHAEL S. WIRTZ
They are two projects in trouble. One is a group of ship enthusiasts trying to save the rusting hulk of an historic passenger liner and the other, an Indian tribe trying to save a long-delayed casino project.
Yesterday, the SS United States Conservancy proposed moving the SS United States upriver to become part of the new Foxwoods/Harrah’s casino project on the Delaware River in Philadelphia. So far, the casino group has shown no interest in the proposal, facing challenges and deadlines of its own.
Continue reading
Last July, we posted about Baltic Bubbly – ‘World’s oldest champagne’, bottles of champagne thought to pre-date the French Revolution found in a shipwreck on the Baltic seabed. Recently there was a tasting of one of the bottles of the historic champagne in Mariehamn. The champagne was judged to be quite palatable and is expected to fetch up to £40,000 a bottle at an upcoming public auction.
Bottles of beer were also found at the same shipwreck. Last week, Finnish authorities said that they would allow one or several modern breweries to replicate the recipe of beer.
Minesto, a spin-off of the Swedish-based Saab Group, has a new approach to harnessing tidal energy – underwater kites. They have recently raised an excessive of €2 million in new capital to test the company’s underwater kite generator design, Deep Green, off the coast of Northern Ireland.
Deep Green Tidal Kites: The Newest Underwater Green Energy Initiative
Continue reading
What did the fire on the Carnival Splendor cost Carnival Corporation? No one really knows exactly, but Carnival announced that they estimate a cost of 7 cents per share. Based on the number of outstanding shares from their 2009 10k, on a fully diluted basis, that puts the estimated cost at around $56 million dollars. Most of this is presumably lost revenue from the cruise operations. The Splendor will be out of service until mid January, 2011.
Thirty years ago HMS Ark Royal was built on the River Tyne at the Swan Hunter shipyard. Last Friday, she sailed home for the last time to be decommissioned and ultimately scrapped. As she moved up river, spectators said their final goodbyes to the ship known as the Mighty Arc.
Poignant final journey for pride of the Royal Navy
Continue reading
For anyone around New York harbor this afternoon and evening, Captains Rick and Karen Miles will be presenting a slide show of their “Arctic Adventures Aboard the Wanderbird” at 4pm and 7pm in the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, Pier 12, Red Hook, Brooklyn. The slideshow covers their cruise this summer of 6,000 miles from Maine to Greenland to Lat 72N.
Wanderbird is a 90′ converted North Sea trawler, now refitted as an expedition cruise vessel accommodating 12 passengers. The cruises and the accommodations look wonderful. Wanderbird is on her south for the season to the island of Culebra, where she will be offering week long cruises. Will over at the Tugster blog has some great shots of Wanderbird in New York harbor, here and here.
Thanks to the good folks at PortSide New York for the heads up about the slide show.
Photo: Jeff Riedel
No one knows exactly how much oil was spilled at Newtown Creek, an industrial canal between the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens in New York harbor, but the best estimates are between between 17 million and 30 million gallons, which is more oil than was spilled by the Deepwater Horizon blowout and three times larger than the Exxon Valdez spill. Oil refineries, storage and transfer facilities along the creek are believed to have leaked the oil into the ground over many decades, polluting the soil, groundwater and sending oil seeping into Newtown Creek. Last Wednesday, Exxon agreed to a settlement to clean up the spill. Video of a cruise up Newtown Creek, after the jump.
Exxon Reaches Settlement Over Newtown Creek Oil Spill
Continue reading
Photo: CLEM MURRAY
The troubled Independence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia announced on Monday that it would continue to keep the cruiser ex USS Olympia open though the end of the year and shift to a three day schedule through the end of March.
Spanish-American warship spared, at least for now
Continue reading
April M. Williams hosts the “Where Are You Today?” Travel Blog. She recently posted a video tour of the Falls of Clyde and an interview with Bruce McEwen, president of the Friends of the Falls of Clyde. The Falls of Clyde, built in 1878, is the only surviving iron-hulled four-masted full rigged ship and the only surviving sail-driven oil tanker in the world. Have you voted for the Falls of Clyde yet? There is still time. Read more after the jump.
I almost prefer visiting Mystic Seaport in the wintertime. The summertime crowds are gone, wood or coal stoves heat the chandlery and the rope walk and the ships are as lovely as ever against a winter sky. Mystic Seaport is especially lovely around Christmas. This year Mystic Seaport is hosting, Christmas by the Sea, a new holiday maritime experience, Thursdays through Sundays, November 26 – January 2, 2011, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
A wonderful collection of more than 9,000 books and periodicals on ships and the sea has gone on display in a new library in Bristol.
SS Great Britain’s ‘significant’ new maritime library
The David MacGregor Library, named after a life-long supporter of the ss Great Britain, is free to the public and also includes an historic archive.
Continue reading
I am not much of a computer gamer, but this looks like fun. Astragon\TML Studios has a new diving simulator that lets you pilot a submersible and ROV around and through the wreck of the Titanic. The graphics may not be quite James Cameron’s standards but do look pretty good nevertheless.
Photo: Craig Greenhill Source: The Daily Telegraph
Earlier in the month we posted about New York harbor’s “graveyard of ships”. Yesterday the Daily Telegraph featured an interesting article about Sydney’s ship cemetery – an abandoned wrecking yard in Homebush Bay where several wooden barges and at least five ships slowly rot or rust away.
What secrets lie in Sydney’s ship cemetery?
Continue reading
Bad news and good news. The Tacoma Tall Ships Organization is no more and the hoped for Tacoma Tall Ships Festival in 2011 will not be happening, a victim of the recession. On the other side of the globe, however, the Australian Wooden Boat Festival on Hobart’s historic Sullivan’s Cove waterfront is on its way in February 2011, and this year it will be free!
Tacoma Tall Ships Festival sunk by recession
Tasmania’s Wooden Boat Festival free next year
Thanks to Alaric Bond for passing on the information about the Australian Wooden Boat Festival
Brad Van Liew has won the first leg of the Velux 5 Oceans Singlehanded Round the World Race arriving in South Africa in only 28 days after his departure from La Rochelle, France.
Van Liew wins 1st leg of race – Charleston sailor reaches Cape Town tired but happy
Continue reading
Donald McNarry, who has died aged 89, was considered by model ship enthusiasts to be the master of “extreme” miniature shipbuilding.
He took up model making as a hobby when he was a boy and built model ships for the rest of his life. From 1955 he worked as a freelance professional and created some 350 models of historic ships covering the period from 700BC to the late 1960s. His styles of presentation included scenic, waterline, full-hull and the traditional Navy Board type – almost all of them constructed according to miniature scales ranging from 100ft to one inch to 16ft to one inch.
Continue reading
After waiting out the hurricane season in the Canary Islands 15-year-old Dutch sailor Laura Dekker has resumed her attempt to sail around the world alone on her 38′ ketch Guppy. Ms. Dekker had been at the center of a ten month Dutch court battle to determine whether she would be allowed to sail alone. If she completes her around the world voyage prior to the middle September 2012, she will earn the title of the youngest solo circumnavigator, a designation now held by Australian Jessica Watson. As Dekker plans on making multiple stops in her voyage, Watson will likely continue to retain the title as the youngest sailor to complete a non-stop solo circumnavigation.