Animal rights groups on Wednesday said gunfire killed a beluga whale nicknamed Hvaldimir, which became famous in Norway after its unusual harness sparked suspicions the creature was trained by Russia as a spy.
The organizations NOAH and One Whale said they had filed a complaint with Norwegian police asking them to open a “criminal investigation.”
He was found dead on Saturday in a bay on Norway’s south-western coast.
The sailing cargo ship Anemos arrived in New York harbor today, completing her maiden transatlantic voyage, her holds filled with over 1,000 tonnes of French cargo. The 266-foot vessel completed the voyage in 15 days, sailing at an average speed of just under 10 knots.
Anemos is the first in a series of eight sailing cargo vessels under construction or on order for TransOceanic Wind Transport (TOWT.) The small ship took two years to build, drawing on advanced sail technology from ocean racing.
Anemos benefits from French expertise in this demanding field. Multiple French manufacturers and designers contributed to the ship’s design, said French shipbuilder Piriou. The hull was built at Piriou’s Romania yard, then transferred to Concarneau, France for outfitting.
Hvaldimir, the beluga “spy” whale has died. The Norwegian public broadcaster NRK reported that the whale’s body was found floating in the Risavika Bay in southern Norway on Saturday by a father and son who were fishing.
The beluga, whose nickname was a combination of the Norwegian word for whale – hval – and the first name of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, was lifted out of the water by crane and taken to a nearby harbor, where experts will examine it.
In the Spring of 2019, fishermen off the coast of Norway near Hammerfest, encountered a beluga whale wearing a harness inscribed with the label “Equipment of St. Petersburg.” After being freed from the harness, the whale remained in the area and appeared to enjoy interacting with humans. Researchers think the beluga may have been a Russian spy in training.
After decades of working to save the historic ocean liner SS United States, the SS United States Conservancy has made the difficult choice to sell the old liner to be sunk to create the world’s largest artificial reef, off the coast of Destin-Fort Walton Beach in the Gulf of Mexico.
According to Okaloosa County, FL documents, the Tourist Development Department is requesting approval for a budget allocation of up to $9 million for the acquisition, remediation, transport, and deployment of the SS United States. This project also includes plans for a land-based museum dedicated to the ship according to getthecoast.com.
The SS United States, a 990-foot vessel launched in 1952, still holds the Blue Riband for the fastest transatlantic crossing by an ocean liner. Currently docked in Philadelphia, the ship faced legal challenges when a federal judge ruled on June 14, 2024, that it must vacate its location within 90 days.
At about 6:15 this morning, local time, the Maersk Shekou, a 332 meter, 8,814 TEU container ship struck and dismasted the STS Leeuwin II berthed at Victoria Quay in Fremantle, Australia’s inner harbor. The container ship also hit the nearby WA Maritime Museum.
Two crew members standing night watch on board the Leeuwin suffered injuries and were taken to a local hospital. Their injuries were described as significant but not life-threatening.
Fremantle Ports said the allision damaged the sailing boat’s masts and superstructure, but the hull appeared to not have sustained major damage.
A crew of 6 adventurers set sail on a 500-nautical-mile voyage in the North Sea from Tvøroyri on the Faroe Islands bound for Trondheim, Norway aboard Naddoddur, a 33′ long Faroese Viking ship replica. The voyage, expected to take 3-5 days, ended in tragedy last Tuesday when the craft capsized in high seas near Norway’s dreaded Stad Peninsula. American archeologist Karla Dana drowned. The remaining five, one Faroese and four Swiss nationals, were rescued from a liferaft.
The voyage referred to as “The “Legendary Viking Voyage,” was organized by Sail2North Expeditions and was attempting to recreate Viking travel between Norway and the Faroe Islands.
Naddoddur was named after Naddodd, a 9th-century Norse Viking credited with the discovery of Iceland. He was also one of the earliest settlers on the Faroe Islands.
A fascinating article by CNN about a robotic fish named “Eve” that swings its silicone tail side to side, as it glides fluidly through Lake Zurich’s chilly water, where it is being tested by SURF-eDNA. The student-led group has spent the past two years building a school of soft robotic fish – of which Eve is the latest.
“By making Eve look like a fish, we are able to be minimally invasive into the ecosystem that we’re surveying,” master’s student Dennis Baumann told CNN, adding that the biomimetic design should prevent other fish or sea life from being startled by her presence. “We can mix, we can mingle in the ecosystem,” he added.
Eve’s ability to camouflage itself as a fish isn’t its only utility. The autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is also equipped with a camera to film underwater, and sonar, which when paired with an algorithm, allows it to avoid obstacles.
With preliminary races of the Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup now underway in Barcelona, Spain, the famous sailing competition is facing the storm of over-tourism protests that have swept across much of Europe, as well as, many tourist hotspots across the globe.
The Guardian reports that according to its supporters, the America’s Cup will bring in €1bn to Barcelona, create 19,000 jobs and, by the time the last sail is furled on 20 October, have attracted an extra 2.5 million visitors to the city.
The ultimate sporting competition for the super-rich marks the latest attempt by the Spanish city to attract “quality rather than quantity” tourism.
Five days ago, the 56-meter-long sailing yacht Bayesian sank at anchor off Sicily in extreme weather. Fifteen people on board were rescued and seven died, including British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah.
This morning Italian prosecutors said that they have opened an investigation into culpable shipwreck and manslaughter over the deaths in the yacht’s sinking. They stressed, however, that the investigation was in its initial stages and they were not currently looking at anyone specifically.
Contrary to initial reports that suggested the vessel may have sunk because of a waterspout, the authorities now say the most likely cause was a localized, powerful wind known as a downburst.
A BBC investigation has revealed that dozens of workers from around the world may have been trafficked into the UK to work for a small family-owned Scottish fishing firm.
Thirty-five men from the Philippines, Ghana, India, and Sri Lanka were recognized as victims of modern slavery by the Home Office after being referred to it between 2012 and 2020.
The workers were employed by TN Trawlers and its sister companies, owned by the Nicholson family, based in the small town of Annan on the southern coast of Scotland.
The 56-meter-long sailing yacht Bayesian sank at anchor of Sicily in extreme weather early Monday morning, with the loss of one dead and six missing. Among the missing are British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah.
Following the sinking, the most common question asked was “How could a well-found yacht of that size be knocked down and sink, even in the high winds and a reported waterspout that were present at the time of the tragedy?”
Was the yacht simply overwhelmed by the weather or was there some aspect of the design or operation of the yacht that made it vulnerable? The immediate answer is that it is just too soon to tell.
The 56-meter sailing yacht Bayesian sank early Monday morning in severe weather while at anchor off the coast of Sicily. The yacht is believed to have been struck by a waterspout. There were 22 passengers and crew aboard when the yacht sank. Fifteen were rescued from a life raft, while one person died. Six are reported missing and feared dead.
Among the missing are British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah. His wife, Angela Bacares, was reported to have been rescued.
Also among the rescued was a one-year-old British girl. The child was airlifted to the children’s hospital in Palermo. Eight people were hospitalized in total, according to the mayor’s office.
Apex boat, Operation Dragoon
Based on the recent conflicts in the Black Sea and the Red Sea, it appears highly likely that the future of maritime warfare will be shaped by the use of naval drones. This made me wonder when the first naval drones were used in combat.
To the best of my knowledge, the first naval drones used in combat were the Apex boats used in Operation Dragoon, the Allied amphibious landing in the South of France during World War II, eighty years ago last week.
These drones were modified radio-controlled landing craft, loaded to capacity with high explosives, intended to be used to clear beach obstacles and mines. The Apex boats were moderately successful yet proved at times to be almost as dangerous to the Allied soldiers and sailors as they were to the Nazi defenders.
The BBC reports that the wreck discovered off the Aberdeenshire coast is believed to be the lost Royal Navy warship HMS Hawke sunk by a torpedo during World War One.
The wreck of the Edgar-class protected cruiser was discovered by a team of divers about 70 miles east of Fraserburgh earlier this week in “remarkable” condition.
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) said Wednesday that a juvenile humpback whale swimming and breaching in Boston Harbor may cause minor delays to ferry service through Thursday, August 15.
CBSNews reports that the 2-year-old whale, estimated to be between 35 and 40 feet long, has been in Boston Harbor since the end of July. It likely followed prey into the harbor, explained Linnea Mayfield, the naturalist manager for Boston Harbor City Cruises.
Last week, US Coast Guard Vice Commandant Adm. Kevin Lunday spoke at the Brookings Institution and addressed the service’s enlisted force’s ongoing 10 percent manning shortage. Entering the fiscal year, the Coast Guard was about 3,000 members short of end strength numbers. “That’s the backbone of the Coast Guard,” Lunday said.
Due to the shortfall, the Coast Guard “can’t crew all our ships” and has had to “temporarily shutter some of our smaller stations,” the vice commandant said.
“We had to lay up three of our major cutters because we don’t have enough enlisted personnel to crew them.” Since the action, the service has shifted funds from other parts of the budget to bolster recruiting and retention.
Boaty McBoatface, referred to as the UK’s most famous robot, recently returned to Scotland after 55 days on a more-than-2,000km undersea scientific odyssey from Iceland, studying the pace of climate change.
BBC reports that the autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) was hunting for marine snow – “poo, basically” in the words of one researcher. This refers to tiny particles that sink to the ocean floor, storing huge amounts of carbon.
The deep ocean, referred to as the “twilight zone”, is enormously mysterious. Acting as the eyes and ears of the scientists, Boaty went there on the longest journey yet for its class of submarine.
Containers caught fire and exploded on the 6,589 TEU YM Mobility today at around 1:40 PM, local time, while berthed at the Port of Ningbo, China. A statement by Yang Ming, the ship’s operator, said that preliminary findings suggest that an explosion occurred in a container loaded with dangerous goods on board. Immediate fire-fighting measures have been taken at the scene, the fire has been brought under control
China Central Television (CCTV), citing preliminary findings from authorities, said the goods included lithium batteries and tert-Butyl peroxybenzoate, an organic compound that is flammable and explosive and should not be stored in an environment over 30C (86F), as reported by Reuters.
In a new study, published in the journal Nature, scientists say that sea surface temperatures over the past decade in and around Australia’s Great Barrier Reef are the highest on record for 400 years. The study concludes that these increased temperatures, driven by climate change, now pose an “existential threat” to the vast coral reef.
Extreme heat has caused five mass coral bleaching events in the past nine years alone.
“The science tells us that the Great Barrier Reef is in danger – and we should be guided by the science,” Prof Helen McGregor, from the University of Wollongong, told BBC News.
Hurricane Debby brought high winds and storm surge as it traveled up and ultimately came ashore on the Gulf Coast of Florida. It also washed packages of cocaine worth more than $1 million ashore in Islamorada in the Florida Keys, officials said.
Debby, which slammed into the state as a Category 1 hurricane but has since been downgraded to a tropical storm, washed the drugs ashore in the Florida Keys, U.S. Border Patrol acting chief patrol Agent Samuel Briggs II wrote on social media.
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