Maersk’s recent order for ten container ships carrying 18,000 TEU and options for twenty more was a “game-changer” according to one expert and if other firms don’t order at least 10,000-TEU ships by this summer, it will be too late for them. He also said a result of the Maersk initiative will be that many middle-sized carriers will be too small for the Asia-Europe trade and too big for intra-Asia trade. He expects many of the 8,000-TEU and 4,000-TEU ships will be scrapped.
The French have not given upon searching for the remains of the Air France Airbus that disappeared over the South Atlantic while en route from Paris to Rio de Janeiro in 2009. An autonomous underwater vehicle (a remotely controlled mini-submarine) located wreckage and some human bodies 12,800 feet below the surface. The search used three REMUS 6000 robots operated by a team from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute on the French ship Alucia. It was WHOI’s third search for the downed airliner. The French cable ship Ile de Sein will continue the search for the plane’s two black boxes. (The Alucia is an interesting vessel. Built in 1974 as a heavy lift ship and launch/recovery platform for diving and submersible operations, the vessel was converted in 2009 into a long-range expedition yacht with luxury accommodation for up to 16 guests but it can still operate three submersibles, and retains a scientific lab and dive systems.)
If you are interested in drilling for oil, or chartering a drill ship, Transocean’s Discoverer Spirit, will cost you something like $520,000 per day. (No wonder any ban on drilling causes great anguish to oil companies.)
Thin Places and Hard Knocks
Off the coast of Belize, the Panamanian-flagged, salt-laden Helga sank, taking with it three of its crew of eleven Cubans.
Somehow the soya bean-carrying bulker Oliva managed to run ashore on Nightingale Island at remote Tristan da Cunha in the South Atlantic. The crew of 22 managed to get off safely but the Panamax bulker soon broke its back and 1,500 tons of bunkers started fouling seabirds, particularly Northern Rockhopper penguins. Bird-cleanup forces soon arrived from South Africa, some 1,500 miles to the eastward. Some 20,000 penguins may be affected. In the UK near the Isle of Wight, the 2,900-ton freighter Paula C ran aground on a shingle bank near the Needles, luckily during the lowest tide of the year (an “astronomically low” tide). The tug Wyeforce helped it get free. At Lerwick in the Shetland Islands, the large (2,403 metric tons) diving support vessel Bibby Topaz somehow managed to take a sharp turn as it passed the end of the harbor’s jetty and ran aground. This was in spite of an assisting tug and the presence of a pilot. The vessel later floated free and none of the 100 on board were injured but the planned voyage to the Gryphon oil field some 110 miles ESE of Shetland was deferred. In the Saint Lawrence Seaway, the saltie BBC Steinhoelft lost control and ended up blocking the Seaway, its bow on one bank and stern against the other. Passage of eight ships was delayed until tugs arrived at the scene. The ship had been the Beluga Fusion when it entered the Seaway the previous week, but was renamed, probably due to sale of the vessel.
About five miles south of the Isle of Man, the fishing vessel Lynn Marie and the coaster Philip met. The FV didn’t sink but suffered extensive damage to its portside bow.
It was kept afloat by pumps rushed to the scene by the Port St Mary lifeboat and HM Customs Cutter Sentinel while the Port Erin lifeboat stood by with another pump. The Port St Mary lifeboat then towed the FV, stern-first because of its damaged bow, to Port St Mary. The Philip was relatively undamaged. In Bangladesh at Chittagong where there always seems some maritime disaster is happening, the North Korean freighter Hyang Ro Bong ran into the anchored Bongo Lanka in the outer anchorage and ended up sitting on the harbor bottom with its bow still afloat. Its cargo of 13,492 metric tons of Pakistani rice was destroyed by incoming water while its bunkers started polluting local waters.
Unusual things happened: In pre-dawn conditions in the Philippine City of Cavite, the tug Hagonoy snagged a net from the fishing vessel Aleja and rammed the FV. One fisherman was missing but sixty-six other fishermen and tug crewmembers were rescued.
Gray Fleets
The short career to date of HMS Astute, the lead ship of a new class of British attack submarines, has been marred by numerous problems including a grounding that featured a collision with a rescuing tug. Last month, the sub was busy hosting various civic dignitaries and no one noticed when a rating donned body armor and camouflage and took an assault rifle from the sub’s armory; after all, he was obviously going on gangway guard duty. Instead, he started shooting, killing one of the sub’s officers and critically wounding another. One of the visitors, the leader of the Southampton city council, reacted swiftly to the flying bullets and wrestled the sailor to the deck.
The engine of a Marine F/A-18C jet fighter exploded on the deck of the carrier USS John C. Stennis during a training exercise about 100 miles off California. Four injured sailors were flown to a shore hospital while six others were treated on the carrier. The jet’s pilot was unharmed.
It was doubly embarrassing when the top of a steel mast on the destroyer USS Gravely snapped off just above the SRS-1 ring antenna because a video production team from the Discovery Channel was on board the recently commissioned (last November) warship.
The Japanese Self-Defense Forces were going to send warships and other equipment to the nine-day US-India Malabar naval exercise but decided that the needs created by the recent earthquake took precedence. Scope of the exercise was trimmed because important players such as the Japanese maritime surveillance aircraft were not available.
New Zealand and the US ships have not operated together since a 1984 rift over nuclear matters so the attendance of the New Zealand naval vessel, the sealift and amphibious support vessel HMNZS Canterbury, surprised many when it participated in the Pacific Partnership exercise with units of the US Navy, Australia, and France. The exercise, created in 2004 after the Indonesian earthquake and tsunami, aims at providing humanitarian, medical, dental, and engineering assistance to nations of the Pacific. The kiwi nation has also been invited to participate in Rimpac 2012, a major, US-led exercise featuring ships from many Pacific navies.
What to do with old aircraft carriers – to wit, USS Constellation, USS Forrestal, USS Independence, and USS Saratoga – is vexing US citizens. Some want to reef the ships as tourist attractions for sport divers and the Navy has sunk at least one carrier (the USS America) as part of live-fire tests. Others think they should be recycled, stating that each carrier represents 40,000 tons of recyclable steel, aluminum, and copper. In fact, the Navy may be accepting bids for disassembly in shipyards. Each scrapping job could save millions of taxpayer dollars and create 1,900 jobs for a year.
White Fleets
Off Norway, an emergency crew arrived by boat to take a sick woman off the cruise ship Ocean Princess but they dropped her stretcher into the icy (minus three Celsius) sea when the vessels moved apart. The British woman, suffering from internal bleeding, was picked up by the rescue boat in about eight minutes and made it to a hospital. At last report her serious condition was improving.
Forty kilometers off Queensland’s Gold Coast, an “unwell” woman had a better ride as she was winched by helicopter from the Rhapsody of the Seas and taken to the Gold Coast airport.
An English female worker on the Disney Wonder failed to report for her shift and was considered to have been lost at sea.
At Port Canaveral in Florida, the 88,500-ton Carnival Pride was buffeted by 85 mph winds. The company later admitted that conditions had “caused the ship to become disengaged from its moorings.” No word on whether any gangways fell but nobody was injured.
Those That Go Back and Forth
The operator of a ferry service from Cape Cod to Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard fiercely opposed construction of a 130-wind turbine complex in Nantucket Sound but, now that the complex will be built, he recently announced that he would run eco-tours of the wind farm using a newbuild hybrid boat. (Tiny Denmark has 6,000 wind turbines and observers have noted that they tend to fascinate tourists and boost tourism.)
Somewhere between Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, the new ferry Blue Puttees took several unexpected rolls in heavy seas and winds of about 60 knots when a stabilizer suddenly retracted due to low hydraulic oil level. Everything went flying and a crewmember had to be treated for cuts and bruises. Off the western shore of the UK between the Isle of Man and Birkenhead, a man on the Ben-My-Chree fell ill and a doctor suspected appendicitis and recommend he be taken ashore. An RAF helicopter obliged. In New Zealand while on a routine crossing of Cook Strait, a male passenger on the Aratere started having seizures. A medic was winched down onto the ferry’s deck from a helicopter, the man was stabilized, and both medic and patient were winched back up into the Westpac Rescue helicopter for a swift flight to a Wellington hospital. There, the man was treated and discharged.
At Galway harbor, three men were hurt when one of two straps snapped while a ship’s crane was lifting the former Aran Island ferry Clann na nOileain onto the cargo ship Thor Gitta, and the ferry’s stern smashed back about nine meters into the water. The men were aboard the ferry at the time of the accident. The Thor Gitta was at Galway specifically to collect the ferry and its sister ship, the Clan Eagle 1, for transport to foreign buyers. The accident happened less than a week after the 7,000-gt Pentanal broke free while anchored and ran aground. It had arrived in South Connemara to collect the two Aran Island ferries.
In New Zealand at Auckland, conservation authorities used three dogs and their handlers to check athletes getting on a ferry to nearby Rangitoto and Motutapu Islands for mountain-bike and running events. Object of the search? Rats. The islands are free of rats and mice and may soon be declared pest-free sanctuaries for endangered wildlife but a rat had recently been found in a van about to be ferried to nearby Motuihe Island, another of the several scenic islands outside Auckland.
In the Philippines in Cebu province , the 11,405-gt ferry Superferry 2 and a cargo vessel apparently tried to simultaneously squeeze through the entrance channel into the harbor at Talisay City but they sideswiped each other. None of the 435 passengers on the ferry were hurt but damage was substantial. Containers on the cargo vessel General Romulo were ripped open and their contents dumped into the sea. Local fishermen then enjoyed a short-term bonanza by salvaging cartons of Bear Brand powdered milk and selling them locally. This was more profitable than the fishing.
Nature
The 8.9 magnitude Japanese earthquake caused global positioning stations closest to the epicenter to jump eastward by up to 13 feet so Japan is “wider than it was before” and NASA scientists calculated that the redistribution of mass by the earthquake might have shortened the day by a couple of millionths of a second and tilted the Earth’s axis by nearly four inches. Another effect: water in the Edwards Aquifer in Texas was displaced about a foot as the underground rock formation was squeezed by the far-off quake. (This and other aquifers often reflect distant earthquakes.)
Videos showed numerous fishing vessels and coasters being driven ashore by the Japanese tsunamis and one report stated that the Panama-flagged general cargo vessel Victory was washed aground in the Port of Ishinomaki, the Panamanian general cargo vessel China Steel Integrity and the Panamanian Asia Symphony had grounded at Kamaishi, the Japanese bulker Shiramizu had grounded at Soma, and the Panamanian-flagged Shirouma was also aground at Haramachi. Thirty-one crew were rescued from the Italian Sider Joy adrift at the Ishinomaki Dockyard, the Panamanian Golden Grace was adrift at Kashima, the Chinese container vessel Long Mu Wang was adrift at Kushiro, and the Panamanian Coral Ring bulker collided with a berth at Onahama. (The 26,000-gt bulker Sider Joy had been launched at the Yamanishi Shipbuilding and Iron Works at Sendai and was being prepared for April sea trials. Damage to the shipyard and its equipment may mean the vessel, valued at over $20 million, could be scrapped. BTW, this vessel should not be confused with the smaller Maltese-flagged coaster of the same name.)
Floating debris (complete houses, containers, and whatnot) prompted the Japanese Coast Guard to warn ships to stay up to 90 miles offshore while passing the earthquake zone.
At Tampa, ospreys built a nest atop the end of a boom, thereby keeping the barge-mounted crane from doing profitable work – the owner estimated that a week's delay cost him $20,000. Under the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act, it is illegal to transport ospreys or their nests without permission. Working with the National Audubon Society, he had a platform installed at the top of an old utility pole. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission signed off on the relocation but the US Fish and Wildlife Service denied his permit because the nest wasn't causing property damage. Then the Audubon Society decided the federal government's regulations didn't address such situations and concluded the state permit and the Audubon Society's support were enough to move forward with the nest relocation.
Brazilian scientists announced that nano-sized fibers from pineapples, bananas, and other fruits might be used to reinforce plastics, making them almost as strong as Kevlar.
Three long-beaked common dolphins died of blast trauma during a naval exercise off California. The Navy stated that there were no mammals in the exercise area when it started the countdown but acknowledged it had spotted the mammals before the explosives went off but not in time to stop the exercise without putting humans at risk.
Metal Bashing
A former marina owner and sailboat racer fell in love with the discarded 3,500-passenger Staten Island ferry Gov. Herbert H. Lehman and bought it at auction for $162,000. Sugarplum fancies danced through his head of converting it into a floating dormitory for college students but the realities of up to $1,000 a day for berthing privileges brought him crashing to earth. An offer on eBay brought 9,000 responses but no takers. He now says, ”I like it but I can’t sell it and I start to hate it.” (Other former Staten Island ferries have been used for a methadone clinic and as prison ships.)
At Providence in Rhode Island, scrapping the old Soviet Juliet-class cruise missile submarine K-77 is proving to be tough. Already capsized and righted, the sub had a smoky fire when welders (more likely, cutters) set fire to fuel in the bilge and the fire spread to insulation. Firefighters had to call on the marine strike team since they couldn’t reach the sub from shore. Scrapping started last Fall and was expected to take three months.
Nasties and Territorial Imperatives
Hiring armed security guards is increasingly popular with shippers but that may lead to more lethal violence, perhaps even “small wars,” predicted one expert. He envisions a quadrupling of hijackings and a change from opportunistic to must-accomplish-at-all-costs missions. Typical of today’s Gilbert and Sullivan anti-piracy policies was when members of the Dutch frigate HNLMS Tromp, flagship of the NATO anti-piracy force, were fired upon when they tried to board a hijacked dhow. Returning fire, they boarded and found two fatally wounded pirates and ten others trying to escape in a skiff. They were captured and the dhow and its rightful crew were escorted to safe waters. Waiting there was, the 1,066-TEU container ship Albedo, captured last November. It hoisted anchor and headed for the Dutch warship. The Tromp fired a shot across its bow and the Albedo returned to anchor. End of news item.
Odd Bits and Headshakers
In February, the 269-gt coaster Nordland 1 grounded on a beach on the northwestern German Island of Borkum right in front of some beach hotels – ”practically in their lobbies” as one person described the scene. The owner and the vessel’s insurance company decided to scrap the vessel where it lay but a salvor proposed a quick solution without pollution risk. He was granted permission and the ship was afloat after only eight hours of work. Greatly pleased were all hands, especially the German Water and Environment authorities.
Using the same technology that allowed the US Navy to differentiate between a whale and an enemy, retired US Navy sonar experts helped create a portable device to detect, diagnose, and monitor strokes in the brain. The device uses six accelerometers mounted on a head harness that hear the unique vibrations made by veins expanding and contracting, aneurysms wobbling, etc and send the data to a personal computer. The device was 97.3 % correct in identifying strokes and correctly ruled out 98.8% of normal patients. It can also separate patients with specific stroke conditions or vascular abnormalities into categories such as ischemia, hemorrhage, aneurysm, stenosis, and arteriovenous malformations. The device is ideal for ambulance and field work such as in combat and sports.
Many years ago, Auckland boasted the Aucklander, a most-modern steam tug, but the vessel had been delivered at the very end of steam’s ascendancy and the tug was soon taken out of service as being too expensive to operate. Moved to Wellington, New Zealand’s capital city, it became a floating restaurant. Years later, it will host the 2011 NZ International Comedy Festival and all seventeen comedians will do their stuff below sea level in what was once the engineroom.
The UK is phasing out all its RAF and Royal Navy jump-jet Harriers, and their pilots (135 RAF, 50 Royal Navy) must find other jobs. The Ministry of Defense will give most (but not all) Harrier pilots a redundancy pay packet near the six-figure range (18 months pay plus £30,000). The overlying rationale behind the generous payout is that there are so many Harrier flyers that it will be impossible for industry to absorb all of them. But twenty or so trainee Royal Navy Harrier pilots must accept lesser alternative jobs (often involving flying a desk) with the Senior Service or leave with nothing.
An error unwittingly gave the crew of a ship unrestricted access to the Internet. The crew, who had already been notified of the company’s intentions regarding future Internet access on all its vessels, wrongly assumed that a new satellite unit had been provided for their unlimited use, and proceeded to download at will. The monthly bill should have been $3,800. Instead, the first bill was for $436,000 for three months of service.
