The Navy was busy in Macnab's Cove (just in side Mauger's Beach) replacing trot buoys. The buoys are used by naval vessels to moor while conducting static sound trials. The new brightly painted buoys will have better visibility for other vessels in the area, and in case no one is aware they are now labelled "NAVY" in large letters.
A barge mounted crane lifts a new buoy and anchor.
The tug Glenside had the Dockyard scow YC601 and a pair of Ville class pup tugs were employed for the work. However since the Navy no longer has a Dockyard crane barge, they hired the barge Commdive II from Waterworks Construction along with their workboat/tug Waterworks I. The barge was built of concrete in 1942 and has been steadily employed ever since. (It is probably the only working watercraft in Halifax Harbour that is older than I am).
Yesterday's arrival at Imperial Oil was not visible until today. Mahadah Silver is a typical handymax tanker of 29, 354 grt, 45,923 dwt, built by Hyundai Mipo, Ulsan in 2016. The ship is registered in the Marshal Islands, the flag of choice for tankers these days.
Unusual for tankers however, it is owned by Omani interests and managed by Oman Ship Management Co. Mahadah is a village of about 2,000 persons in Oman.
Its last port was Antwerp, Belgium. Due to refinery slow downs and pipeline limitations in Ontario and Quebec, Imperial is not refining enough product domestically to meet demand, so is again importing.
Another tardy Canada Atlantic Express arrival today - Maersk Palermo arrived this afternoon - its usual arrival day would have been Saturday.
Looks can be deceiving, but the ship appears to be well loaded - perhaps to St.Lawrence River maximum draft. Maersk / CMA CGM may now transport empty containers, on a non-revenue basis, from Montreal to Halifax, so perhaps some of those are empties. Nevertheless if the line is shipping that much cargo out of Montreal, it bodes well for Halifax to "top off" with more loads to reach deep sea / salt water draft.
A new to Halifax cruise ship made it inaugural call today. Royal Caribbean International has repositioned Adventure of the Seas this summer to sail from Bayonne, NJ before moving to Fort Lauderdale in the fall.
Built in 2001 by Kvaerner Masa, Turku, the 137,276 grt ship has a capacity of 3,114 passengers and is a Voyager class ship. It has had several updates over the years, and judging by the white vapour emanating from its funnel, may have had exhaust gas scrubbers installed.
Last week's visitor Ile d'Aix, the French cable ship, had a longer than planned stay in port after it was detained by authorities.
It has been reported that the ship spilled a quantity of synthetic lube oil into the harbour May 29, which could not be recovered by the Canadian Coast Guard. I had noticed a small CG work boat trying to break up the sheen - without much success- as it was driven southward towards McNab's Island, just before the submarine USS Toledo sailed.
The wind is driving the sheen southward past the HT 2 (Ives Knoll light buoy) as a Coast Guard workboat tries to break it up.*
The ship sailed for the Gulf of St.Lawrence June 2 and gave its next port of call as Méchins, QC. It is currently showing at the Verreault shipyard there - perhaps having its problem fixed.
For more on the ship, see the post from May 5
* There are two buoys marking Ives Knoll. a rocky ledge extending north from McNab's Island.
The northern most buoy is HT2 and is equipped with a light only.
The second buoy, H22, is west of Ives Knoll and is a light and bell buoy, also equipped with a radar reflector. The bell, which sounds when the buoy is being rocked by waves, can sometimes be heard from the Halterm breakwater. It marks Calling In Point 7 for Vessel Traffic.
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