Thursday, April 7, 2011

Other Shores - April 2011

Some shippers voiced concern that a major freight-rate war might break out once again on the westbound leg of the Asia-Europe container traffic. 
 
The International Transport Workers’ Federation wants to extend the double-pay zone for seafarers facing piracy risk from the Gulf of Aden to the Indian Ocean. If accepted, shippers would pay an additional $120 million in wages each year.

Refusal by the Libyan government to approve use of chartered aircraft to evacuate Americans from Libya forced the US Government to charter the high-speed ferry Maria Dolores. But its master decided that bad weather meant keeping the vessel at its dock at Tripoli for two days before he transported 338 people, 183 of whom were Americans, to Malta. Meanwhile, the British frigate HMS Cumberland made two round trips to Malta with evacuees, and numerous aircraft, both chartered and military, lifted others, some from airstrips near remote oil fields. 

In 2006, China imported its first LNG. Now it imports vastly larger amount to fuel its growing industries and to help clean up its filthy environment. But do not be surprised if China becomes an LNG exporter. As the US has recently learned, shale deposits can carry natural gas and China’s deposit are huge. 

As this column is being written, damage from the Japanese earthquake, subsequent tsunamis, and nuclear powerplant breakdowns are becoming obvious although the extents are still ill-defined. But wasn’t it fascinating to watch on TV as coasters and large fishing vessels were pushed inshore by the tsunamis!

Thin Places and Hard Knocks
As usual, ships capsized or sank: At Sochi, a port city just north of Russia's border with the republic of Georgia on the Black Sea coast, bad weather broke a Tanzanian dry-cargo vessel in two. The bow sank and the stern was driven ashore, where rescuers managed to save ten of the crew. Off Chile, bad weather caused the long-liner Faro de Hércules to sink while on a hake fishing trip and only 38 of the crew of 42 were saved by other ships.

Ships also ran aground: Off Long Beach, California are four artificial islands concealing oil production rigs. During a storm, the 624-foot bulker Ocean Sunrise somehow drifted onto Island Freeman. The weather may have overwhelmed tugboats accompanying the vessel. In Norway not far from Oslo, the Icelandic cargo ship Godafoss managed to run aground on a well-charted reef in Norway’s only marine natural reserve. Some oil spilled but the spill wasn’t as damaging as first feared. The vehicle carrier Hoegh Seoul ran aground on the outer River Weser, probably because of a rudder failure. The vessel was carrying a full load of vehicles and was refloated by the tugs Bugsier 3, Bugsier 4, Bugsier 6, and Bremerhaven. In Indonesia, the cargo ship Jutha Pathama, carrying rapeseed and castor-seed extraction meal, ran aground near Duni island of Jamnagar’s Marine National Park.

Outside Richards Bay in South Africa in a crowded anchorage, the 149,505-dwt bulker Dong-A Rhea ran across the anchor chain of the 26,300-dwt bulker African Lion and the anchor chain ended up seriously wrapped around the bigger vessel’s propeller. In spite of a strong current and 2.5-meter swells, divers managed to cut the chain free. In the East China Sea, the cargo ship Zheryuji No. 618, carrying 500 tons of scrap steel, collided with another ship and capsized. Seven crewmembers went missing. In the Karabiga anchorage in Mamara region of Turkey, bad weather caused the container ship Esther to drag its anchor and it struck the far-smaller bulker Celal Amca, which was loaded with coal. Eventually, the container ship managed to heave up its anchor and it moved to another part of the anchorage. No leaks, water ingress, or pollution but probably lawyer talk and some bent steel. 

At Manta in Ecuador, five firemen and a crewman were severely burned on the tuna seiner Lautaro. Welding was the probable cause of the explosion and fire. Elsewhere, one man died and two others were injured by fire on the cargo ship Shirvan while it was docked at Baku, the capital and largest port of Azerbaijan. Again, violations of safety procedures while welding were reported as causing the explosion and fire. 

Humans died: An employee of a Finnish refining company went missing from the oil tanker Palva during a routine trip in the North Sea and was presumed dead. In Deira Creek within the shadows of Dubai’s skyscrapers, fires raked two dhows, one carrying 15 cars, textiles and other material and the other, highly inflammable materials. One sailor jumped into the water and was caught in a rotating propeller. “His body was cut into two when it was recovered.” said one eyewitness.

High winds at Baltimore tore the 960-foot container ship Atlantic Companion from its berth and pushed it to a grounding across the channel. Four tugs quickly responded. Elsewhere in the harbor, the same winds tore an 80-foot crane barge free and it drifted into the Coast Guard’s base at Curtis Bay. The container ship Salmarine Nomazwe was anchored off Cape Town when fire broke out in three of six containers containing charcoal. (Another report the fires started in coal while the ship was en route to Cape Town.) The ship returned to Duncan Dock where local firemen put out the fires. 

Gray Fleets
The US Navy’s standards for morality and PC standards seem to be exceptionally high. The commanding officer and a female top warrant officer on the destroyer USS Stout were relieved of command. Their failure? They allowed some of the crew to act badly while in port. Eight of the Stout’s sailors were dismissed for fraternization, being drunk, disorderly conduct, and violation of orders while in port. And, several years ago, the executive officer of the carrier USS Enterprise made and showed about two-dozen raunchy movies for entertainment of the crew. As a result of an in-depth investigation of his expressions of concern for crew morale, the Navy is recommending letters of censure and other punishments for (hang on!) forty officers (including six admirals) and enlisted men.
The Royal Navy officially opened a new rehabilitation center at HM Naval Base Devonport for Armed Forces personnel recovering from long-term injuries and illnesses. About the same time, HMS Ark Royal, the former flagship of the fleet, was retired three years earlier than previously scheduled, a major casualty of the government’s recent defense cuts. 

White Fleets
Repairs to the fire-stricken giant cruise ship Carnival Splendor included installing two new generators and a new engine. The 220,000-lb engine, intended for a sister ship still under construction in Italy, was flown to San Francisco in an Antonov AN-124, one of the world’s largest cargo planes. The fire cost the owner about $65 million in repairs and lost revenue.
At Akaroa in New Zealand, the Pacific Sun had a problem with one engine and making repairs was impossible at nearby Lyttelton (the port for earthquake-stricken Christchurch). The ship bypassed two stops and returned to Australia at a slower speed, and passengers received A$50 for each port skipped. 

At the time of the 6.3 earthquake, the Europa was in port at Lyttelton and 57 of the crew and 267 passengers were on shore. Nobody was hurt. A Korean research ship, also in port, was also undamaged. 

CMA CGM, the world’s third-largest container shipping line, now carries passengers in reasonable comfort or, depending on a person’s tastes, even luxury, on its new 13,800-TEU containerships. A variety of voyages are offered, all at a standard rate of €100 a day.

Those That Go Back and Forth
Two ex-Swedish ferries have started operating between Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. The chartered ships were shortened and heavily modified for the new service. Both have military names, Highlanders and Blue Puttees, the last commemorating The Royal Newfoundland Regiment. It served at Gallipoli in World War I and later the 780 men who went into the Battle of the Somme were reduced to 68 available for roll call the next day. When the Regiment was first formed, shortages forced the creation of puttees from blue cotton cloth rather than the drab material commonly used for the leg wrappings. 

In the general vicinity of the Statue of Liberty, a man jumped off the Manhattan-bound Staten Island ferry John Noble and the ferry’s rescue boat (or a Coast Guard boat, according to another account) did its thing. The unconscious man, suffering from hypothermia and perhaps other problems, was taken to Bellevue Hospital for observation.

In Australia, as a ferry approached the western end of Polmaise Reef on a voyage from the Great Barrier Reef’s Heron Island, it was hit head on by three huge waves in succession. Passengers were flung out of their seats and hit the ceiling. Two men suffered broken bones and a child received minor injuries. And in Sydney, an East by West harbor ferry carrying 44 people, many schoolchildren, nosed into at least one wave that broke forward windows and flooded the cabin. One passenger was knocked overboard but was rescued. He and the master were taken to a hospital with suspected hypothermia. (One of the schoolchildren had just moved to Wellington to escape the earthquake-created devastation at Christchurch.)
In the Philippines, the passenger vessel Kinswell caught fire while undergoing repair at Cebu City. Welding was probably responsible. The vessel had been plying the Cebu-Tubigon (Bohol) route before it went into preventive maintenance about two weeks earlier.

In Indonesia, the ferry Balboa, with 33 passengers and 27 six -wheeled and two-wheeled vehicles, ran into tropical storm Carlos while several miles at sea. After battling huge waves, the ferry ended up on rocks near Pantai Raru Rote harbor.

Nature
NOAA released images of the Nantucket whaling ship Two Brothers that sank nearly 200 years ago on French Frigate Shoals near Hawaii. Master of the vessel was Nantucketer George Pollard, who had previously skippered the whaler Essex when it was rammed and sunk by a sperm whale (thus leading to Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick.”) During the subsequent 95 days in a small-boat, starving crewmembers resorted to cannibalism and Pollard ate his own cousin. After returning to Nantucket from the wreck on French Frigate Shoals, Pollard never went to sea again and ended up as a night watchman.

Searches for possible oil and gas in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas are also finding commercial quantities of Pacific cod, walleye pollock, and other fishes. 

Japan suspended whaling in the Antarctic, at least for a time, but Sea Shepherd’s Steve Irwin found work in the search for the vanished Norwegian yacht Beserk. On the upper side of the globe, the Canadian Coast Guard’s Leonard J. Cowley escorted Greenpeace‘s Arctic Sunrise from sea into St. Johns after it radioed that it had suffered damage in a hold when a container broke free in 11-meter seas some 530 kilometers south of Cape Race.

Recovery from the damage done by Category 5 Cyclone Yasi to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef may take decades. Winds of up to 177 miles per hour were one villain. 

Metal-Bashing
The Chilean earthquake of February 2010 inadvertently launched the sizable research vessel Cabo de Hornos before it could be christened and launched the next day. The tsunami then washed it back on soft land. Recently, a salvage firm dug out the sand, hardened it into a roadway, and used multi-wheeled transporters to carry the vessel onto a 300-foot deck barge. The barge was then towed to a drydock, which was submerged, allowing the Cabo do Hornos to float free. 

The members of Maersk’s new Triple E-class (Economy of scale, Energy efficient, Environmentally improved) super-large container ships will be delivered between 2013 and 2014 and each will carry a record 18,000 TEU in 23 rows across. The ships will be distinguishable by size and their separated engine and bridge superstructures. At 400 meters, they will be also the longest ships in the world now that former title-holder, the 458.45-meter ULCC tanker Knock Nevis, has been scrapped. (Other length competitors are the very large ore carrier Berge Stahl at 328 meters, the cruise ship Allure of the Seas at 361 meters, the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise 341 meters, and the very large ore carriers being built for Vale at 360 meters but a Triple-E, at a deadweight of 165,000 tons, will be out-hefted by the ore carriers. Each Triple-E will be crewed by only nineteen people, will have a top speed of 23 knots, and might have cost $160 million each but the added specifications raised their price to $190 million. 

Nasties and Territorial Imperatives
Although warships from 23 nations are on anti-piracy work in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, results have been less than possible due to memberships in differing organizations operating in accordance with differing policies. The pirates are equally diverse and seem to fall into four groups controlled by warlords. Most groups are strongly military in nature and one is even headed by a “fleet admiral.” By the way, most of the ransom money ends up abroad. 

The anti-pirate warfare has been escalating, sometimes with good results, sometimes not. The oil tanker Guanabara was seized 328 nautical miles southeast of Duqm, Oman. As four pirates boarded the ship, he crew of 24 took refuge in the vessel’s citadel and sent out a distress call. The destroyer USS Bulkeley, backed by the Turkish NATO frigate TCG Giresun, was dispatched and its specialist boarding team climbed aboard the Guanabara and, without exchange of fire, detained the pirates. 

But sometimes, results were less than desirable. Pirates captured the American sail yacht Quest with four Americans on board. An entire carrier strike force (the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, guided-missile cruiser USS Leyte Gulf, and guided-missile destroyers USS Sterett and USS Buckeley) responded and started a radio dialog with the pirates. Two pirates even boarded the Sterett to negotiate. Then someone on the yacht fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the Sterett and gunfire was heard inside the yacht. Several pirates appeared on deck and moved to the bow, hands in the air. A special-forces boarding party found the four Americans shot and dead and, in the process of clearing the yacht, two more pirates died, one by knife and the other by pistol. The rest of the 19 pirates were taken prisoners. (The couple owning the Quest operated a Bible ministry and distributed Bibles. It is not known whether these facts had anything to do with their executions.)

Yachties of all nationalities are sailing around the world and a large number (perhaps 100) want to cross the waters in which the Somali pirates operate. The yachties are organized enough (via SSB radio and the Internet, etc) that they are prepared to sail in a flotilla but the Royal Navy says it doesn’t have the resources for an escort across the Indian Ocean for those indulging in “unnecessary sailing.” A Dutch spokesman for the yachties said, “We are not simply cruising around irresponsibly. We are caught on the wrong side of an ever-changing and expanding problem.” (However, circumnavigating sailors tend to be very conscious of the piracy threat and do their very best to take suitable precautions. These sailors may have hoped for an armed escort leading to an easy access to the Mediterranean because the alternative is a hard slog thousands of miles south to the Cape of Good Hope.)
For a third time, pirates targeted the container ship Maersk Alabama. An embarked security team fired warning shots and four suspected pirates in a skiff with a hook ladder bugged-out. In April 2009, pirates held the master for days in one of the ship's lifeboats. Navy snipers killed the captors and arrested one of the pirates. He was recently sentenced to more than 30 years in a US prison.

All piracy isn’t in the Mid-East. Include Bangladesh, Malacca Strait, Malaysia, the South China Sea, Vietnam, Cameroon, Brazil, and Peru. And add the Gulf of Guinea on the west side of Africa, an area where piracy isn’t quite as sophisticated as elsewhere. There, fourteen pirates boarded the chemical tanker Panega off the coast of Benin. They ordered the master to sail the tanker to Gabon in order to offload the cargo. After several failed attempts near Gabon, Warri, and Lagos in Nigeria, the pirates settled for stealing the crewmembers' personal belongings and then took the master and two engineers ashore with them while the tanker was left adrift. The three crewmembers later returned to the ship. In a separate incident, three persons approached a chemical tanker at anchor off Lagos. They fired their weapons in the air and demanded the gangway to be lowered. The master refused and moved the vessel from the anchorage. 

Odd Bits and Headshakers
The crew of a tug at Lyttelton, New Zealand was routinely steaming between the knolls at the mouth of the harbor when the recent earthquake struck. The tremors caused them to think debris was caught in both nozzles of the tug’s azimuthing drives and then the engines went into emergency shutdown! Noting that shore objects were suffering damage, the crew restarted the engines and resumed the job. (The port suffered remarkably little damage in spite of being directly above the shallow epicenter of the 6.3-magnitude earthquake, and was partly operational in a day or two. However, no cruise ships or container vessels will be able to use the port this year.)

At Portsmouth, Virginia, the converted-tanker, crane-carrying Zhen Hua 24 had unloaded two towering container cranes and was pulling away from the pier when one of the cranes still on board clipped one of the offloaded cranes and knocked it off its tracks. The ship was arrested and the pier company sued for $14.65 million in damages. 

In Antarctic waters, the 48-foot Norwegian steel sailboat Berserk dropped off two crewmen onto the ice shelf, who, using quad-bike ATVs, made a dash for the Pole to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Amundsen’s reaching the South Pole. Soon after, the Berserk was not to be found and its EPIRB apparently had deployed. The Sea Shepherd’s anti-whaling vessel Steve Irwin searched and found an inflated but unused liferaft from the yacht so it and its three crewmen were presumed to have been lost. Other searching vessels included New Zealand’s newest offshore patrol vessel, HMNZS Wellington, and the passenger-carrying Russian scientific vessel Professor Kromov

A Brit who operates a property-maintenance business was unloading his van at a tip (dump) when he was surprised to find a sizable missile in the rubbish. Authorities promptly closed the busy M6 highway nearby and evacuated the neighborhood until experts decided that the missile, probably a Sea Cat anti-aircraft missile used by the Royal Navy some twenty years ago, was harmless. It turned out that one of his men had found the missile in the trash from a house-clearing job.

Helicopter crews can always use a little more rescue training so a Royal Navy chopper crew happily retrieved a set of galvanized metal steps that a storm had washed away from a Royal Navy building on the Lizard near St Keverne.